


The Stigmata (Boys Don't Cry Blood)

by caimani, disasterboy



Series: Stigmata [1]
Category: As It Is (Band), Waterparks (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Bleeding Eyes, Blood, Demons, Friendship, M/M, Reform School, Religious Imagery & Symbolism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-08-25
Packaged: 2019-10-23 11:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 26,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17682173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caimani/pseuds/caimani, https://archiveofourown.org/users/disasterboy/pseuds/disasterboy
Summary: What happens when six boys of various troubled backgrounds end up at a haunted reform school? Clashes with harsh authority figures, some supernatural problems, and dealing with it all with the power of friendship.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> so, hey! we originally had this on tumblr but we decided to move it here for convenience because of the new text block limit lmao. enjoy!!! :D

Both of the teacher’s hands slammed into the desk behind Patty with a loud thud that made him jump. He held himself as still as possible, keeping his eyes on the surface of his desk. The whole class was silent.

“Mr. Knight,” Mr. Mason said icily. “Am I boring you?”

Patty held his breath, hoping that Awsten wouldn’t be an idiot this time. He snuck a glance to the side, where Ben was very determinedly looking away from whatever was happening behind Patty. No hints then.

“Nope,” Awsten said, sounding entirely unconcerned.

 _No, sir,_ Patty wanted to turn around and tell Awsten. They were only halfway through their second week at this horrible reform school and already Awsten had been assigned remedial study four times. Patty had sat through the first time with Awsten and it had been truly awful. Writing _I will obey authority._ on a paper five hundred times, to the point where he felt like his hand would fall apart, and then being sent to the laundry room to help the janitors clean ‘since you’re not man enough for real work.’ Patty wasn’t interested in repeating that any time soon.

He didn’t know what Awsten’s other three remedial studies were like.

“Mr. Knight, leave this classroom and report to Sergeant Steele for remedial study,” Mr. Mason said, straightening up in an abrupt motion that shoved Awsten’s desk.

“Aw, you know he’s my favorite person here,” Awsten said mockingly, getting up from his desk. There was a shuffling sound as he gathered his things.

“Get the hell out of my classroom and stop disrupting the boys who are actually trying to learn,” Mr. Mason said.

“Mm-hm,” Awsten said. The door shut behind him with a click.

Patty fixed his posture as Mr. Mason walked back towards the front of the room. Eyes ahead, back straight, hands on the desk, feet flat on the floor. Ben was still looking away. Patty bit back the warning he wanted to give.

Mr. Mason slammed his fist against Ben’s desktop as he passed him. Ben hunched in on himself but slowly fixed his posture as well.

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

“It’s kind of funny how the only way we have classes together is when we all get kicked out of class,” Otto was saying as Patty sat down with the group for dinner. The six of them— Awsten, Otto, Ali, Foley, Ben, and himself— had all started sitting with each other the first few terrifying days of struggling to understand the school, and it had just become a habit from there. Most of them would gather to do homework together too, even if some of them (Otto and Awsten) weren’t especially interested in doing the work.

“I don’t think I’d consider remedial study a class,” Ali said under his breath.

“How’d you get thrown out this time?” Foley asked, looking up from his dinner at Otto.

Otto shrugged. “Same as every other time. Didn’t do the work right.”

“You’d think they’d realize that not letting you be in class has some impact on your ability to do their assignments,” Awsten said with a chuckle.

Otto shrugged. “I actually tried this time.”

Patty sighed, staring down at the food on his tray. It was vegetarian, all of it things that he normally loved. But today he just felt… bad. Worse than he’d felt the entire week and a half he’d been at this school. He took a bite anyway.

Ben looked up at him. Patty tried for a reassuring smile.

“Hey we’re meeting up again this evening to study, right?” Patty said, trying to sound more optimistic than he felt. “Library again?”

“Sure,” Ali said.

Foley and Ben both nodded.

“Not us,” Awsten said.

“You two need help with your assignments more than any of us,” Ali shot back.

“We’ve got plans,” Otto said cryptically.

“What plans?” Ben asked.

“A little something we came up with during remedial study today,” Otto said. He and Awsten exchanged sneaky smiles that didn’t make Patty feel particularly comfortable. What the hell.

“When did you have time to conspire?” Patty asked. That one time, Sergeant Steele had glared daggers into Patty’s back for so long, he had imagined the sergeant was still watching him for hours afterwards. It was haunting.

Awsten smirked. “That old guy thinks he’s watching us but he misses so much. You’ll see.”

“Can you at least save it for the weekend?” Ali said, sounding exasperated. “At least try not to get in any more trouble this week.”

“Not gonna make a promise I think Otto’s gonna break,” Awsten said.

Patty groaned. “Hanging out with you is probably painting a target on my back,” he muttered, half to himself.

To his surprise, Foley was the one who gave a little laugh at that. “Better we all stick together, huh? Spread the target amongst ourselves.”

“That’s awfully brave of you,” Ben said. “I still don’t want to get dragged into remedial study with those two,” he nodded his head at where Awsten and Otto were struggling to contain their giggling.

Patty shook his head. He couldn’t control Awsten and Otto, but, apart from acting out in class, they didn’t actually do anything stupid. They’d be fine. And he’d be fine as long as he kept doing his work, kept his head down, and didn’t step out of line at any moment.

This year that they were all forced to spend at St. Stephen’s Reformatory School for Boys, it wouldn’t be so bad.


	2. Chapter 2

Ali hated this fucking school. It hadn’t even been two weeks, and he was already about ready to climb the damn walls of this freaky place. He hated everything about the reform school; the teachers, the staff, the inedible lunches, the random ass cold spots all over the building, and the constant detention— sorry, _remedial study_ — were only a few of the many things he despised.

The only thing that made the horrible teachers and dehumanizing punishments (almost) worth it was the new friends he had made. It felt like he was naturally drawn to them, and he looked forward to seeing them at lunch and after class every day. Ben with his silent yet rebellious demeanor; Patty with his bright (if rare) smiles that could light up a room; and Foley with his jokes and awesome hugs. They made his life a bit brighter, and he was thankful for them.

As soon as the bell to his last class rang and the teacher dismissed them, Ali ran out of his seat like a rocket whose fuse had just been ignited. He made his way to the courtyard, where Patty and Ben were standing underneath a large tree. Patty’s face brightened when he saw Ali, but the smile faded as a passing teacher glared at him.

“How long have you guys been waiting?” Ali asked. He decided against hugging them, just in case that teacher decided to stick them in remedial study.

“Our class only ended five minutes ago, so not very long,” Ben answered. “Are we ready to go or what?” 

“I’ve been ready since this morning.” Ben’s lips tugged upwards a bit into a small smile, and Ali couldn’t help but smile back.

“What about you, Patty?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be. I hope you guys know, though, that if we get in trouble I will never forgive you.”

“Hey, it’s not like we’re banned from walking around the school. We’re just… not going to be supervised this time. We’ll be fine, honest.”

Patty rolled his eyes but motioned with his hands for them to continue anyway. Ali checked around the courtyard, making sure there were no teachers or staff in sight, before slinking away. Ben and Patty turned to follow him as he left the courtyard. There was a side door across the yard from the main entrance, and Ali had yet to see anybody come or go through that door in the week and a half of his confinement.

This was the one escape that Ali got from the stifling aura of the classrooms or the chilly atmosphere of the dormitories. Little by little, he had been exploring the mansion-like school. It gave him something to do besides sit around in his dorm room all day. Patty and Ben joined him sometimes (Foley declined whenever they asked), and it was great fun to see what they could discover and how many hidden places they could fit into. Several parts of the school, like the entire west wing, had been abandoned due to some unfortunate accident or a health code violation, and these places had fallen into disrepair and decay. These were Ali’s favorite parts to explore, even if things did get a little spooky sometimes. Ali often felt invisible eyes following him as he explored, and he would see something flicker in the corner of his vision but turn around to find empty space. Patty had reported the same feelings, but Ben said he’d never felt anything of the sort. Ali didn’t know if he was lying in order to try and appear cool and collected in front of his friends, or if he genuinely didn’t think anything was wrong.

“Why don’t we ever invite Awsten or Otto along on these, uh… these, uh, excursions?” Ben asked. His voice barely rose above a whisper as they slipped through the door and into an unlit hallway. Ali pulled out his cell phone, which they weren’t technically allowed to have on them, and turned on the flashlight so that they could continue on in the darkness.

“Because they’d get us caught. Besides, they’re in detention anyway.”

“Where were you keeping your phone?” Patty asked.

“I keep it in my interior jacket pocket. Nobody ever looks there.”

Patty’s mouth formed a small ‘O’ shape. Nothing else was said as the three of them crept down the hallway. This hallway much resembled the main hallway of the school building, except there were fewer doors and it had obviously been abandoned for years, if not decades. The trio kept walking, passing doorway after doorway until the hallway abruptly turned to the right. After they rounded the turn, the three students came face-to-face with a doorway. There were no other doors down this section of hallway, and the single door was slightly ajar.

Something about this place made the hair on the back of Ali’s neck stand up. A faint but still nerve-wracking feeling settled deep in his stomach, and one glance at Patty told him that his friend felt the same thing. There was something malevolent in that room, and while he didn’t know how he knew that, Ali didn’t want to stick around to find out what that “something” was.

“Come on, let’s go back. I don’t like it here,” Ali said, which was the first time anything even remotely close had come out of his mouth.

“Yeah, I don’t like it either. It feels… evil,” said Patty. The two of them started to turn back around, but Ben quickly reached out and grabbed their arms to stop them.

“What, are you guys backing out now? I don’t feel anything; we’re going in, and that’s final.”

“Who made you the leader?”

“I did. Now let’s go.” Ben let go of Patty and Ali and dutifully marched forward. Before Patty or Ali could stop him he threw the door wide open, disturbing several cobwebs and lots of dust as he did. A blast of cold air swept over them, and Ali found himself shivering and rubbing his arms through his jacket sleeves to keep warm.

“Isn’t it fucking August? Why is it so cold?” Ben didn’t seem the least bit worried about the evil that Ali could feel trickling down his spine. Reluctantly, Ali followed his friend through the doorway, and he could hear Patty’s soft footsteps behind him. As soon as they crossed through the doorway the temperature instantly dropped, leaving the boys freezing cold with no source of warmth. The cold had flushed away any remaining curiosity Ali had had about the room, and now all he wanted was to get as far away as possible.

Ben had stopped in the middle of a circular room, with only the one door leading in and out of the room. There were several portraits hanging from the wall, many of which were covered in dust and cobwebs and had translucent black veils laid over them. There was one, however, of the current headmaster, and several portraits had remained uncovered by veils, which probably meant that whoever was portrayed in the paintings were still alive. The paintings seemed to follow Ali with their eyes, watching his every move as he slowly made his way over to where Ben was standing. There were dead things all over the floor, ranging from rats to simple weeds and flowers that had grown through the concrete. Ali had to pick his way over the mass destruction on the floor. There was something lurking in the shadows— or, more accurately, the shadows themselves seemed to be moving, and several times a hand-like mirage tried to reach out and grab at Ali.

The scariest thing about it, though, were the several upside-down crucifixes on the wall.

“This place isn’t so bad,” Ben said. He was being too loud; he was going to either get the three of them caught, or he was going to disturb whatever evil creature lived in the room.

“Nope, fuck this. I’m-” Patty began to say ‘ _out_ ’, but he cut himself off with a scream as he toppled to the floor.

“Patty!” In an instant Ben was by his side, grabbing onto his arms and trying to help him stand again. For the first few moments, Patty wouldn’t (or maybe couldn’t) get off of the floor, but eventually, the shadows that had wrapped themselves around his ankle dissipated and he was able to stand once more. As soon as his feet had touched the ground he was grabbing Ben’s hand and running for dear life out of the room, with Ali hot on their heels. Ali turned and slammed the door shut with as much force as he could muster, and he only let out the breath he had been holding when he heard the lock click into place.

“We are never coming back here,” Patty said. He was still clinging to Ben, who looked more confused than anything.

“Guys, it was just a normal room. What’s so bad about it?” he asked.

“I can tell you that, young man.” Ali instantly froze as he recognized the voice. Slowly he turned around, only to find Ms. Sharpe, one of the school’s vice principals, standing behind the trio of boys. “It’s off limits to students.”

The evil thing that Ali had sensed in the room had returned, but this time in the form of a short and rather pudgy old spinster lady. The smile on her face told the young freshman that they weren’t getting off the hook without some serious punishment in their future. 

Patty was glaring at Ali out of the corner of his eyes. He wasn’t going to be let off the hook by Patty, either, and somehow he felt worse about that than the prospect of remedial study.

At least whatever was inside that room hadn’t followed them out.

Hopefully.


	3. Chapter 3

Ben paused halfway through writing _I will not trespass_. for probably the hundredth time. Would they even notice if he wrote something just a bit different? He drew a tiny frowny face in the place of the O and went on with writing more repetitions of the line. The little rebellion almost made him smile, but the reality of the pointless punishment was impossible to ignore.

As if writing this shit down was supposed to force them to follow the rules.

Ben sighed and looked up at the front of the room, where Mrs. Graves was staring straight at him with her eyes narrowed.

“Sit up straight, Benjamin,” she snapped.

“Yes ma’am,” he muttered and adjusted his posture. Slightly. The seat was uncomfortable no matter what he did. Like hell was he going to sit with his back straight in it. He went back to writing.

The room was quiet save for the scratching of their pencils on paper and the ticking of the clock on the wall. Awsten and Otto weren’t there; probably in another room dealing with Old Bastard Steele. Or making Steele deal with them.

Time crawled on. Ben hid a couple more little faces in the lines. His hand was aching and he wanted to stop, but one glance at Patty in his peripheral vision made him keep going.

Better to get this over with.

There was a rustling noise behind him, where Ali was sitting. Without thinking, Ben started to turn his head to look.

“Face the front!” Mrs. Graves snapped.

Ben slumped back into his original position in the stiff-backed chair. Whatever.

“Alistair, you aren’t done yet,” Mrs. Graves said, walking down the aisle between the rows of empty desks. Ben noticed Patty tensing up as she passed between them. Her heels clicked on the floor with each step she took, forceful and harsh. “Resume your task immediately.”

“Sorry,” Ali said in a low voice behind Ben. The rustling noise resumed for a second. “It’s cold.”

“Deal with it.”

“Yes, ma’am. Sorry.”

“And sit up straight, Benjamin,” she added as the sound of her heels came back towards Ben. “Unless you’d like to write out more lines?”

Ben didn’t reply, but he reluctantly sat up again. He was already looking forward to getting back to his and Patty’s dorm room later so he could lie down on his mattress, however shitty it was. He made a tiny face with little Xs for eyes in the next repetition of the stupid sentence he wrote.

Once they were done, Mrs. Graves took the papers from them. Ben silently dared her to look more closely at his to find the plethora of tiny faces sticking their tongues out. But she was only looking at the top one: Ali’s.

“Report to Sergeant Steele in Room 129,” she said, dropping the papers on the desk behind her. “He’ll handle the rest of your remedial study.”

Fuck. Ben couldn’t hold back the grimace at that. And unfortunately Mrs. Graves was only a few feet away from him.

“Not looking forward to it, are we, Benjamin?” she said, her lips curling in a rather cruel smirk.

“No. Ma’am.”

“Then I suggest you not go slinking around areas of the school that are off limits to students,” she said. “Obey the rules, and your time here will be more pleasant. That goes for all three of you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Patty said.

Ben left the room before he could do anything else to piss off the evil old bat. Once he, Patty, and Ali were a safe enough distance away, he groaned loudly.

“That wasn’t great,” he said. “I’m sorry, we should have left that room sooner—”

“It’s not your fault,” Patty said. “You had no way of knowing. And I was the one who screamed.”

“You had good reason for that,” Ali muttered.

Ben opened his mouth to argue— whatever, the room was spooky inside, but literally every room in this fucked up school was creepy— but he shut his mouth, remembering the genuine panic on Patty’s face. Seeing that had been enough to freak Ben out back in the room, even if he had no idea what could have caused such a reaction.

Maybe one of the rat skeletons?

They arrived at Room 129 and Ben’s stomach lurched with dread. Yeah, it was better to get this over with, but… god, it was going to suck. Whatever the old ex-military bastard was going to make them do today. The not knowing made it even worse.

“It’ll be alright,” Patty said in a soft whisper.

Ben turned to look at him. Patty was smiling, and he reached out to grasp both Ben and Ali’s hands, squeezing them for a moment. Ben felt the fear and tension in his chest ease up.

It would be alright. They’d be together at least.

Patty let go of their hands and strode forwards to open the door. Ben wanted to chase after the lost touch, but before he could move, the door was open.

“You again,” Sergeant Steele said.

He was standing at the far end of the room in front of the huge blackboard with his intimidating message of the day on it.

_PAIN IS THE GREATEST TEACHER._

Otto, Awsten, and three other boys were all standing in a lineup in the middle of the room. There were no desks or chairs anywhere. The walls were decorated with pictures of muscled soldiers in uniform, more quotes about masculinity and discipline, and thinly veiled military propaganda. Ben could barely hide his disgust at it all.

He hated this room. He hated Sergeant Steele. He hated the school that allowed— and _encouraged_ — this shit to happen. All in the name of “fixing troubled boys” like him. Yeah right.

Ben dragged himself into place in the line. Steele walked down the line, pausing to glare and taunt each one of them in turn. Starting with the boys Ben wasn’t familiar with and working his way down to Ben, Patty, and Ali’s end.

“You think something’s funny, Otto? We’ll see if you’re still smiling like that in two hours.”

Fuck. Two hours?? Ben tried not to look too nervous as Steele drew closer.

“Excited about spending more time with your partner in crime here?” he said, eyeing Awsten. “Guess again. Otto, move to the end of the line.”

Otto moved, but he did so in an obnoxiously slow manner. Probably to piss Steele off.

“Still won’t cut your damn hair, Ben?” he said when he stopped in front of Ben. “Jesus, you look like a fucking girl.”

Ben forced himself to remain quiet, like everyone else had. The second time he ended up here with Awsten, the other boy had made the mistake of talking back to Steele. It was about something completely pointless, about how Awsten didn’t like the all-black uniform.

It had not ended well for them that day. Three hours of mowing and raking and pulling thorny weeds and hauling old rotting logs at the edge of the school property.

Steele shook his head in disgust. “No, you’re too ugly to be a girl.” He moved on to Patty next.

“What, you gonna cry, Patrick?”

Ben’s hands clenched into fists. To his right, Awsten very obviously turned his head towards Steele’s back. He stuck out his tongue at Steele and waved his middle finger at him. Idiot.

“Boys don’t cry. Guess I got it wrong, _you’re_ the biggest girl here, not Goldilocks over there.”

Ben’s fists shook. It was getting difficult to remind himself why he shouldn’t get out of line to punch Steele. But one look at the man did the job: the guy would crush him. And he’d be delighted at the opportunity to do so in front of the rest of the boys.

Ben tried to force his anger down. He tried to just let things happen around him. This would all be over soon. They’d get through this in two hours— hopefully less— and they’d all gather in his and Patty’s dorm after this to… recover. Yeah.

Steele moved on to Ali.

Steele went to the front of the room to deliver a harsh speech about the necessity of discipline. Ben didn’t listen to a word of it.

Finally, Steele revealed that the punishing task that day would be cleaning the school’s tall narrow windows. He took them all to a closet with supplies and made sure that Awsten and Otto were as far as possible from each other the whole time. They moved from room to room, hallway to hallway in relative silence, apart from Steele barking his instructions and criticisms of their work.

Ben tried to stick close to Patty, but he didn’t get a chance to say a word with Steele hovering around.

After two hours, Ben’s knuckles were painfully red and on the verge of cracking and bleeding. Ali and Patty were in the same shape. They returned to the dorm hallways without a word between the three of them.

It was miserable. And the miserable feeling persisted when Ali and Patty both sat down on Patty’s bed.

But when Ben pulled out a jar of healing hand cream, both Ali and Patty’s faces broke into matching smiles, and Ben felt the warm spark of hope burning in his chest again.


	4. Chapter 4

Otto had not been looking forward to the weekend. Usually, high school students couldn’t wait for the break from classes, but since they lived in this pathetic excuse of a schoolhouse the students were watched with an even closer eye than usual. Nobody got away with anything on the weekends, and it was not something Otto enjoyed very much. So, needless to say, he was kind of dreading Saturday and Sunday.

That is, until he had found the planchette.

The thing had just been sitting on the top shelf of one of the cabinets (that Otto had had to use a stepping stool to reach), abandoned and covered in dust, and, honestly, Otto had been doing it a favor by slipping it into his coat pocket. Luckily that bitch Steele hadn’t noticed, and he walked away from the remedial study with a triumphant smirk on his face.

“What’s with the smile? Did you suddenly start getting off on cleaning or something?” asked Awsten as the younger boy hurried to catch up with him. Sergeant Steele had tried his best to keep them separated, and Otto had missed his so-called partner in crime. With Awsten back at his side he felt rejuvenated, and even though his hands hurt like hell the presence of the other boy was enough to permanently cheer Otto up.

With the smirk still growing and widening on his face, Otto grabbed Awsten’s hand and practically dragged him towards their shared dorm room. As soon as they were both inside and the door was locked, Otto pulled out the planchette and tossed it to Awsten.

“What… Where did you-”

“It was just sitting there in one of the closets.”

“You didn’t find the actual board that went with it?”

“I searched the rest of the closets again while Steele went to the bathroom. This was all that I found.”

Awsten hummed, turning the planchette over and over in his hands. It was still kind of dusty, but once Awsten wiped off the dust with his uniform jacket sleeve the smooth black surface seemed to stare directly into his soul.

“Cool. How are we gonna use it without an actual ouija board, though?”

Otto didn’t even blink as he responded. “We could make our own. We’d have to do it in secret, but-”

“Perfect. I’ll google what we need.”

. + . + . + . + . + . + . 

Sunday night rolled around, and Otto found himself sitting across from Awsten on their dorm room floor with a brand new ouija board placed between them. The board itself wasn’t much to look at; it was literally a piece of cardboard with letters scrawled on it in Awsten’s rushed handwriting. The planchette was placed in the middle of the board, and the two boys tentatively placed their fingertips on the shiny black object. An electrifying shock ran up and down Otto’s arms, and he shivered.

“Remember, don’t let go until the very end.” Otto nodded solemnly, and Awsten grinned. Otto double checked that the candles and sage were still burning and that the salt barrier remained unbroken before he turned back to Awsten.

“How do we st-”

“Hey, all you ghosts out there! It’s me… uh, your boy, Awsten!”

Otto sighed and rolled his eyes. However, as amusing as Awsten’s introduction had seemed, the planchette remained motionless. 

“Uh, hello? Is anybody there?”

“Let me try,” said Otto. He cleared his throat before speaking. “If there are any ghosts here with us tonight, can you please let us know.”

The planchette didn’t budge.

“Wow, lame.”

“Shut up, dumbass.” Awsten let out a small “hmph” but otherwise did as Otto demanded. Otto let the silence carry on for roughly thirty more seconds before making a second and third attempt. Both ended in failure, and by the end of his third try at talking to ghosts he could see Awsten getting fidgety.

“What now, Awsten?”

“I wanna try again.”

“Go for it.”

Awsten took the lead again, but as soon as he opened his mouth Otto felt something else enter the room. It had no physical form— Otto couldn’t see anybody or anything else in the surrounding area— but there was definitely a third being with them. It wasn’t just a passing spirit or whatever either; no, it was something powerful and evil. The hair on the back of Otto’s neck stood up, and his arms erupted into goosebumps as the temperature in the room dropped suddenly.

Fucking finally.

Awsten made pointed eye contact, his mouth still hanging open, and Otto knew he felt it too. The rational part of his brain, however small it may be, was telling him to stop, to end the ritual and to get out of the room as fast as possible, but-

“Hello there. I’m Awsten, and that’s Otto. Can you tell us your name?”

Too late now.

The negative feeling only got stronger and stronger, and just as Otto was about to suggest ending the ritual the planchette started to move beneath his fingertips.

“Holy shit,” Awsten breathed. Otto didn’t move as the pointer moved to spell out whatever the entity’s name was.

“N…O…N…A…M…E… “No name”?”

Or, uh… maybe not its name. “You don’t have a name?” The planchette slid to the “YES” that was hastily scribbled next to the badly-drawn sun.

“Cool, okay, you don’t have a name. That’s cool. Do you have anything that we can refer to you as?”

The planchette moved over to the “NO”. 

“Okay, then can you tell us what you are?”

_N…O…T…A…G…H…O…S…T_

“Not a ghost. Awesome,” Otto muttered. Awsten grinned at him before asking the next question.

“Can we guess what you are? Sort of like a 21 questions type of deal?”

_YES_

“Alright, so, uh… were you a human before you became what you are now?”

_NO_

“So you were created as you are?”

_YES_

This back and forth session continued on for several minutes, with Awsten doing the main portion of the talking, save for when Otto would suggest a question to ask the creature, and answer by answer they approached a conclusion.

“I think I got it,” Awsten whispered. Otto raised his eyebrows at Awsten, as if to try and tell his roommate to get on with it.

“Are you a demon?”

Much to Otto’s conjoined horror and excitement, the planchette moved to the ‘YES’.

“Holy shit,” Awsten said for the second time that night. The planchette moved away, but then returned to the ‘YES’ after a millisecond.

“Oh, you have a sense of humor. Alright, buddy, I have another question for you if that’s alright.”

_G…O…A…H…E…A…D_

“If you possessed someone— say, me, for a hypothetical situation— what would happen to whoever you possessed? Like, would they get freaky skills and shit, or would it just be a miserable ride-along?”

“Awsten-”

“Not now, Otto, the adults are talking.” 

Otto stared at Awsten in shock as his friend followed the planchette moving over the board. Was he being fucking serious? He didn’t even care about what the demon was saying to Awsten. Sure, he had thought that talking to the demon was fun, but possession was on a whole different level. Even he knew that nothing good could come from Awsten being inhabited by a demon.

By the time Otto finally looked back down to the board, the demon had finished spelling out whatever long and complicated answer it was trying to give. He didn’t know what the demon had said, but Awsten looked pleased enough, which was never a good sign.

“That sounds like a good idea.”

“Awsten, please think about this. You don’t know what it’ll do if it has control of your body.”

“Hey, relax. It’s my body, it’s not gonna take total control of me. I’m gonna use it to bust us out of here and beat up all the teachers, and there’s nothing it can do because it’s in _my_ body.”

“A-”

“So, demon. I am totally on board with this possession thing. Tell me how we get started.”

The planchette moved from where it had come to rest in the middle of the board to once again cover the ‘NO’.

“No? What do you mean no?” The planchette remained motionless, but the demon hadn’t yet left. It was ignoring Awsten, or at least refusing to fulfill his wishes. Otto could see Awsten getting visibly madder. He was beginning to regret his decision to go along with this.

“Alright, dickhead, listen up. I’ll make you a deal; you possess me and help me and my friend bust out of this fucking hellhole of a school, and I won’t call a priest to banish you back to hell.”

“Jesus Christ, Awsten!” Otto yelled. Beneath them, the planchette moved again, but it only swirled around the board in figure-eight motions.

“What does that mean? Why is it doing that?” Awsten asked.

“It means it wants to leave the board.” Otto began sliding the planchette over to the ‘GOODBYE’ in order to close the board and release the demon, but Awsten stopped him.

“No, we’re not letting it go until it possesses me! It’s being a little bitch, and I don’t like little bitches.”

That did it. The planchette began to move faster and faster, and both Awsten and Otto had trouble keeping their fingers on it. A strong gust of wind ruffled Otto’s hair, but he was too busy focusing on the planchette that he didn’t pay attention to the wind until it completely obliterated the salt barrier. The candles burned brighter, with the tops of the flames nearly reaching the ceiling, before going out altogether and plunging the room into almost total darkness. Any scent of sage that had been in the air before was now gone.

“Awsten, you pissed it off! Just end it and let it go!” Otto cried out. Awsten didn’t respond, so Otto took that as his cue to end everything. He slid the planchette over to ‘GOODBYE’ again, and as soon as Otto’s hands had reached their destination the wind stopped. The candles were re-lit, and the smell of sage returned. The salt barrier didn’t return, but Otto was okay with that. The demon’s presence was no longer in the room, and they were safe.

Otto looked at Awsten, who was glaring right back at him. He was almost as pissed as the demon had been, but Otto wasn’t scared of his roommate.

“You’re not allowed to talk to demons anymore.”

. + . + . + . + . + . + . 

tho̕s̸e idiot̷s͝ f̢iņa̵l̕l҉y̧ closȩd͜ ͜t̕h̵e ̸boa͠rd͢. i fl̷ed ̢f̴r̴o̴m̷ t̶h͢e r̨o̸o͟m,̧ b͟u̷t̴ i di͠d̸ņ't̶ l͘eave͞ ҉t̸he̡ ͜b҉u͟ildi҉ng͝.͜ ̕th͝is was̸ m̨y҉ h͞o͜m̸e—͜ h҉a͜d ̨b̢eȩn ͟fo̡r y͜e҉ars—̸ ͏an̶d̷ i ̕w͢a͘s̕n'͟t͜ ab̨o͜u͠t ҉t̴o l͜eav͞e̢ jưs͏t͞ b҉eca͏u͡se͡ s̢o͞me̴ ̡pu͝nk di̛srespect̵e҉d ͠me̶.͘ 

i͡ ҉m̢ad̨e m̡y͞ ͞way͞ ̡throu̵gh̢ t͏he ͘ha͡l͏ļs of͝ ͡t̢h̛e b͜ui̢ldi̸n͟g, ̷tu͜r̶n͝in͏g ͢çorne͘r̨ ͏af͠te̢r ̵cơr̢n̡er ͠a͞ņd͡ d͏odgin͡g͟ s͘everal̷ sp͘i̵r̸i̵ts. one o͘f th͜e͞m, a͡ sa͟d͠-look̛ing b͠oy wit̛ḩ a͟ ba͘seba͝l͞l ͟c̸ap ̨on̵ h͢i̷s̴ hea̸d ͜a҉nd a̸n electr͡i͘c g̡uita͢r ̨in͟ ͢his̕ ḩan͟ḑs, ̡look̢ȩd͢ up ̷a͢t ̧me as ͟i ͘p̕a͡ss̷e̴d, ̨b̵ut i ̸did̛n'͠t e҉ven s̸p͢ar҉e hi͝m a̕ s̶econd ҉lo͠ok ̴a̢s i̛ ̡w͠ent҉.̴

i̵ so͡o͘n ͘f̸ound͏ m͡ys̶elf̷ i҉n͝ a̷nǫther dormįt̛ory ̢r҉oom,͡ and͜ ̢i ̵p̵as͠s͝e͝d th͘roug̷h ͢the ̶doo͠r̷ ea͜s̷il͢y enoug͜h͝.͘ ͜t͡wo y͏o͠un̢g me͞n̕ wer̨e͢ s͡l̶ee̸p͘i̶ng̢ ̴so̵und҉l̵y i͝n͘ t͟h̷is͡ ̵ro̴om, on̶e͠ i̡n eac̸h b̕ed,͠ ̢and̷ ͡i҉ appr͞oa͝c̕hed ͡the b͟ed̡ ͝on ̧th̷e ͝r̨ight͜ to͏ in̛sp͞e̵ct͜ ͘t͘he͢ ḩu͝m̡an i̵n̸ ͟i̶t.͢ ͏he͡ ͏w̵as ͝p̛al̕e͘,͏ b̡u҉t҉ ̛no͡t ̴to͘o p̢a̡l͟e, an͘ḑ ͞h̵ad͠ s҉ho͜rţ dirty̵-blo̵n̶d͜ę ̸hąi͘r.̢ ̨i͟ c͜o͞u͘ld̛ ţel̵l ̛t҉ha̢t ̵hȩ ̶w̕a҉s mi̡s̕er͠a͝b̕le, and̷ i͡ w̕on̴d͢e̸r̕ed͜ if that̷ ͠w͠a̕s ̢becąuse of̷ the ̢envir̷on̢ment͜ ͝he͞ ̷w̢as̕ ̕i̛n͡ ǫr ͡i͢f ̧it w̧a͞s͟ fo̡r an̵o̵t̕her r͠easo̵n͠.̢ st̷i̶ll, he̶ bo̵r̸ed͟ m̧e, an̢d̡ ͠i͟ m̷o̶ved ̸ţǫ ͝loǫk at ̕the ot͟her ̕b͜o͜y.͡ ̶ 

thi͠ş one i̸nterest̛ed͏ ͝m̶e̴ mo̸re.͜ lo͏n͜g ̴b̴londe̷ ̸h̨air, ͝s͏mudge҉d̶ ͡ęy҉eli̵n͟er͠ tha̸t͘ h͠a̸d ̧bee҉n̕ r̵ebe̸l͠liou͜sl͡y͟ ap̢p̢l͟i̢ed̕ b̨efo͢re ̕bed͟, ͏an̕d ͏s̶ki̵n ̕nea͘r͢l͝y ͜as ̵tr͡an͟slu҉c͜ent a̸s͏ tra̢c͘ing p̨ap͞er.͟ ͜he,͝ to̡o̷, ̡w̶as̢ ̧m̧i͢s̡erabl͝e, b͠ut ͏h̨i͞s ͏m̸isery ͟c҉a҉ll̸ed͟ out t̴o̢ m͏e l̨i͢ke a s͡ongbi͏rd̴. i̧ ͢w͡ou͞l͝d b̨e̡ h̛oldin̸g͘ ̕my b͟r̨e̷at̡h ̨i̢f͢ ͞i ̴had th҉e͘ a͘bi̕lįty̴ to̴ ͝b̸re̴at̸he͢.҉

he wa̸s ̢p̧er̨f̕e̷ct̡.


	5. Chapter 5

Patty jumped into consciousness as his alarm blared next to his ear. He got up to turn it off, and then sank back down onto his bed. The ancient springs creaked and the mattress provided little actual comfort, but at that moment, Patty didn’t really care.

Another week.

Saturday and Sunday had both passed far too quickly. Patty, Foley, Ben, and Ali had split the time between avoiding the staff, keeping out of trouble, and trying to finish all the assignments they’d been given. He felt like he’d barely gotten any rest at all.

Well… at least he could try to make this week go by better. He still wanted to explore, but they’d be more careful about it. Classes weren’t bad as long as he didn’t act out. He could do this.

Patty climbed out of his bed and glanced to Ben’s bed on the other side of the room. Ben was still asleep, curled up and facing the wall. Patty left him there— Ben probably needed a few extra minutes of sleep— and headed to the bathroom.

The bathrooms in the dorm rooms at St. Stephen’s were one of the creepiest things that Patty had to deal with on a daily basis. The old pipes were exposed, running up the wall and along the ceiling. The light fixture above the sink cast a gloomy yellow light over the cramped space. The shower was cramped enough to make Patty feel claustrophobic, and the way the knobs creaked when they turned sent chills up his spine.

But at least they weren’t communal.

Patty flipped on the light switch and went to the sink to grab his toothbrush.

Something caught his eye in the square mirror above the sink. Patty flinched at first, sure it was some giant black thing on the mirror.

But it wasn’t.

It was him. It was his own reflection, expression contorting in horror as he realized _that was his hair. That was his face._ Patty grabbed at his cheeks. This was real. This wasn’t a dream. He grabbed his hair and pulled it so he could see it with his own eyes.

It was black. He pressed his fingers into the… the marks on his forehead and they stung like fresh cuts.

No. No, this couldn’t be happening.

Something like this happened in movies or books or— not in real life. Not to a normal person like him!

“NO!” He screamed, tugging harder at his hair as if somehow he could break out of this nightmare and return to normal. He stumbled back into the wall, alternating between staring in shock at his hair and the _perfect row of six little crosses spread across his forehead._

There was a distant thump from the dorm room and a moment later, Ben crashed into the bathroom.

“What’s—” he began, but stopped before he could finish his sentence.

Patty turned towards Ben, feeling uncomfortably exposed and horribly out of his depth. What the hell was going on here? Ben— Ben wouldn’t do this to him. But he was the only one in the room. They kept the door locked, and it creaked loudly enough that Patty would hear if someone else came in.

Then… what was the explanation? There had to be an explanation. People didn’t just wake up like this!

“What did you do to yourself?” Ben said, his voice a whisper.

“I didn’t do this!” Patty said. He grabbed at his hair again. “Why would I— _when? How?_ ”

Ben shook his head, confused. He squinted at Patty’s face. “Is that… what is that?” He pointed at Patty’s forehead.

Patty covered his face, overwhelmed. “I don’t know! They hurt! You didn’t do this, right?”

“No! I fell asleep early! But— did Awsten and Otto come over?”

“N-no?” Patty said. He peeked through his fingers at Ben. “I didn’t let them over. Why would they do this though? And how— I was asleep!”

Their shared confusion was abruptly interrupted by a frenzied knocking on the door. Patty’s heart leapt into his throat. Oh no, oh fuck. They’d been shouting, hadn’t they? Someone was here to come check on them and they would see Patty like this and he was going to be—

“Hide!” Ben said frantically, pulling Patty out of the bathroom.

Patty stumbled as he ran into the room and looked around. There was no closet in their dorm room— just his bed and Ben’s bed and their dressers and desks. The knocking sounded again and Patty dived for his bed and pulled the covers over him.

“Hey was that Patty screaming?”

Patty recognized the voice, muffled as it was. Otto. Patty kept the covers securely over his head.

“Is he alright?” That was Ali. His room was four doors down. Fuck, how loud had Patty been screaming? Did any of the staff hear him?

“Uh, we’re fine,” Ben said. “Patty’s fine. Everything’s okay.”

“Patty?” Ali called, and the knocking sounded again.

“He’s um, he’s sick?” Ben said, not sounding the least bit convincing. Patty squeezed his eyes shut and slapped his hand against his forehead. He nearly swore at the pain that radiated from the cuts upon contact. Damn it, those hurt.

“Patty?” Awsten said, and the knocking became more insistent.

No, no, no, if they kept it up then someone else was definitely going to hear.

“Guys, please, it’s nothing—” Ben was trying.

“Ben, just let us in, whatever it is, we can help.”

Patty seriously doubted that. He pulled the covers off and sat up. Ben made eye contact with him, from where he was leaning against the door. Patty nodded solemnly. Might as well. He’d have to face them eventually.

Ben opened the door and all four of their friends tumbled in. Their reactions were similar to Ben’s: shock and disbelief. Well, almost all of them…

“Wait a second, how did _you_ get those?” Awsten said, marching over to Patty. “Those marks… those are a sign of— that motherfucker!”

Patty’s dread faded slightly. “What? What are you talking about?”

Awsten pointed at the crosses on Patty’s forehead. “Did you get possessed? You instead of me?”

“Possessed?” Ben repeated.

“What the hell—” Foley said.

Otto suddenly smacked Awsten on the back of his head. “You idiot! I told you not to taunt that demon!”

“DEMON?” Patty said, forgetting to keep his voice down. He leapt off the bed and grabbed Awsten by the front of his shirt. “What did you do?”

“Just— just a stupid thing last night,” Awsten said, stuttering even as he was transfixed by Patty’s appearance. “It didn’t even work; the demon we were talking with escaped—”

“You’d better give us all more details than that,” Ali said in a low tone. “Otto? You were in on this?”

Patty glared from Awsten to Otto, not releasing his hold on the former. Otto shrunk away from them towards the wall of the room. “I mean, we were just— it was just something to do, you know? I didn’t think we’d get anything. And it sort of… got out of control. We were talking with a demon and Awsten tried to get it to possess him—”

“What?” Foley said. “Why?”

Awsten wilted in Patty’s hands. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “It was stupid, I know. I didn’t think it would get away.”

“Yeah!” Otto said. “That’s weird. Do you feel any different?”

Patty blinked and let go of Awsten. He felt his chest. His heart was still beating, albeit a bit faster due to the stress of the morning’s revelations. He felt freaked out but… he didn’t feel like there was anything inside him. No voice, no heavy weight, no sudden urge to kill or destroy or whatever it was that demons did. He looked at the others in the room.

“No?” he said, unsure.

Ben carefully drew nearer to Patty. Patty’s heart thumped harder as a new concern lodged itself in his chest. If… if he really was possessed— well it would certainly explain the hair and the marks on his skin, he supposed— what was he going to do about it? He was stuck in a reform school, and he was already dealing with the strain of having to—

Patty’s eyes widened. “How am I going to go to class?”

The room fell silent. Anxious, Patty reached up to touch the marks on his forehead again. They hurt just like before, but they weren’t bleeding or anything. Just red lines, like fresh healing scars. It was still super obvious, and not something that Patty could explain away as an accidental injury.

Foley spoke first. “You could stay in your room?”

“No, that won’t work,” Ali said. “They’d come check on him. Is there any way we can cover it up?”

“I’ve… I’ve got some makeup,” Ben said. “I don’t know— I’ll try to cover the marks.”

“They’re called stigmata,” Otto said.

“I don’t care what they’re called,” Patty said. The panic in his chest was slowly subsiding. “You think you can hide them, Ben?”

Ben nodded. He went to his dresser and dug out a black bag. “Here, uh, sit down on the bed?”

Patty sat down and held still while Ben started brushing something onto his forehead. He tried to hold back the wince as the brush touched the marks, but he didn’t quite manage to hide the pain completely.

“Are you alright?” Ben said, dropping the brush and grabbing Patty’s hand.

Patty felt like his eyes were watering. “Yeah, I’m okay, I just wasn’t prepared—”

“You’re bleeding!” Awsten exclaimed, leaning to look over Ben’s shoulder.

“Shit…” Foley said, covering his mouth.

“What?” Patty reached up to touch the cuts on his forehead, but Ben slowly shook his head.

“Not there…” he said. “Your eyes…”

Oh no. Patty touched the wetness at the corners of his eyes instead. Sure enough, his fingertips came back with blood. Blood so dark it was nearly black. Patty felt sick.

“I don’t know if I can do this…” he said.

Ben’s hand squeezed his. Patty looked up into Ben’s face and was almost blown away by the openness and sincerity he found there. Patty’s other hand moved to rest on their clasped hands, feeling more grounded with the additional contact.

“We’ll figure this out,” Ben said, with more confidence than Patty had ever heard from him before. “We’ll all skip classes today, see if we can figure out how to fix this.”

Patty’s heart lurched. “Don’t skip classes—”

“No, we’re gonna be here for you,” Foley said, sitting down on the bed next to Patty. “The worst they can do is give us remedial study. We can put up with that if we can get a couple of hours to help you out.” Ali sat down on Patty’s other side. Even Otto and Awsten looked… apologetic at least. But they both nodded as well.

Patty swallowed. His eyes were burning, and he really didn’t want to get a face full of bloody tears, but it felt like it might be inevitable.

“As… as long as you can cover up the marks,” Patty said. “I’ll go to class like this.”

“But your hair—” Ali said.

“Hey, at least black’s a natural hair color,” Awsten said.

“They probably still won’t like it,” Otto said.

Patty wiped the blood away from his eyes. “I’m thinking showing up to class like this will be better than hiding away all day. Just,” he glanced at Ben. “Let’s try and make sure they don’t see the marks on my face.”

“Stigmata,” Otto said.

“Quit calling them that,” Foley said. “It sounds creepy.”

“Again, I don’t really care what they’re called,” Patty said. The fear was starting to creep back in— the reminder of why he had the marks. The demon. He shivered and hoped it would go away if he didn’t think about it too much. He shook the thought from his head. One problem at a time. Classes. “Can you all get out of our room so I can change and Ben can make me look normal?”

“Oh shit,” Awsten said. “We _are_ running out of time, aren’t we? See you guys at breakfast!” And with that, he and Otto and Foley left.

Ali lingered for a moment.

“It’ll be alright,” he said, hovering at the door. “We’ll figure out what’s going on.”

Patty nodded. Ali left, and Patty turned back to Ben.

Ben looked apologetic as he picked up the brush again. “Sorry if this hurts.”

“It’s okay,” Patty said and closed his eyes as Ben put the brush against his skin. He was more gentle this time, and the soft strokes of the brushes were almost soothing against the sting of the cuts. Patty held still with his eyes shut until Ben finished.

“Alright,” Ben said softly. “You look fine.”

Patty opened his eyes and looked in the mirror in the eyeshadow palette that Ben was holding. He looked… he looked normal. Well, apart from the faint traces of blood on his cheeks and the black hair. Patty wiped at the blood again.

“Thank you so much,” he breathed.

Ben smiled. “Glad it worked.” He hesitated, his smile falling a bit. “You feeling okay?”

“Yes,” Patty said. However, as he said so, he felt a very small, very dark so͟me͞t͟hi̢n͟g unfurling in his chest. He was smiling back at Ben but it didn’t feel like him. But before he could panic properly, Ben had nodded reassuringly and returned to his dresser and the feeling was gone.

Shaking, Patty touched his chest. What was that?


	6. Chapter 6

As soon as he set foot into his first classroom, Patty was wishing he had taken Ali’s advice and skipped class. Every single pair of eyes in the room automatically turned to stare at him as he walked in and took his assigned seat in the middle row against the wall. Only Otto was in this class, but he was stationed across the classroom from him, and Patty felt more alone than ever. 

The harsh bell went off, signaling the start of class, and the teacher had yet to appear. Patty was hoping that they had a substitute that day— subs were usually nicer, and they would have no way of telling that his hair had drastically changed overnight— but, to his dismay, the teacher walked in even before he could finish his thought. 

It was Ms. Sharpe, the vice principal who had caught them exploring on Friday. She walked stiffly, like somebody had hot-glued a ruler to her spinal cord, and each tap of her high heels on the linoleum felt like a freezing cold stab at Patty’s heart. Luckily her back was turned to him, and she didn’t notice him even when she turned around to address the class.

“You all know what to do.” She was referring to the homework they were supposed to complete over the weekend. Patty quickly rummaged through his book bag and pulled out the pristine and unwrinkled sheet of paper he had been given on Friday. Ms. Sharpe hated wrinkled papers.

He set the paper down on the edge of his desk and placed his folded hands in his lap as he waited for Ms. Sharpe to collect the homework. She started at the front, as usual, and slowly worked her way towards the back. As she moved closer and closer, Patty only grew more and more nervous. What was she going to say about his hair? What was she going to _do_ about it?

Ms. Sharpe stopped next to his desk. Patty didn’t look up, but he could still feel her sharp gaze residing on the back of his head.

“So, you finally decided to drop the innocent act, eh, Walters?”

“It wasn’t an act, ma’am,” he defended.

Wrong choice.

“Look at me when I’m speaking to you, _boy_.” Patty nearly flinched at the harsh tone of her voice, but he still obediently turned to face her. Her cold, unnaturally green glare met his own blue eyes like a wolf meeting a rabbit’s eyes from across a clearing in the woods. Ms. Sharpe bore her name well, and Patty was reminded of this when her gaze stabbed at him as he sat helplessly.

“We do not tolerate acts of rebellion here at St. Stephen’s. This includes dying your hair.”

“Ma’am, I wasn’t the one who did this.”

“Oh? Then who, pray tell, did?”

“I don’t know, ma’am.”

“You don’t know, or you don’t want to name your accomplices?”

“I don’t know. I was asleep when it happened.”

“Asleep?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I find it incredibly hard to believe that you remained asleep for the entire process, and I am appalled that you would even think about lying to me.”

Patty visibly deflated. Even if it was true (for the most part), he had known that she wouldn’t believe it. Why should she? He caught Otto’s eye, and the look of pure guilt and apology on his face only made Patty feel worse. It wasn’t Otto’s fault (not entirely, at least) and he didn’t want Otto to blame himself for him getting in trouble.

“I can say, though, that despite your pathetic attempts at lying, I’m glad that you decided to stop pretending to be an innocent person. This only proves that you undoubtedly belong here.” Ms. Sharpe paused in her speech to mess with Patty’s new hair, picking up a few strands and staring at it with disgust before letting it drop back onto his head. “I’m giving you remedial study for the rest of the day. Pack up your things and go meet Sergeant Steele.”

As Patty watched Ms. Sharpe walk away, he felt a tear sliding down his cheek. He wiped it off before standing up to leave, though; the last thing he needed was Sergeant Steele yelling at him for crying. At least it wasn’t blood this time.

He was pretty sure Ms. Sharpe was smiling as he left. He didn’t look back to confirm it.

. + . + . + . + . + . + . 

Patty didn’t show up after class.

Ben was instantly on edge when only Otto showed up to their usual meeting spot in the courtyard. Usually Patty was with him since they had first period together, but now it was only Otto, looking sad and scared at the same time. 

Awsten was on his feet as soon as Otto entered the courtyard, wrapping his arms around Otto. Otto seemed grateful for the comfort, but a passing teacher snapped at them for showing affection and they pulled apart.

“What happened? Where’s Patty?” Ben asked. 

“He’s in remedial study for the rest of the day.”

“For the rest of the day? What the fuck did he do?” Awsten asked.

“He didn’t do anything. Sharpe thought that his hair was a sign that he wasn’t innocent or some shit like that.”

“He’s probably freaking out,” Foley said. “We need to get in there.”

“What good would it do to have all of us in there? You know how Steele is. We need to get him out of there,” Ali countered.

“You do realize that there’s no way we would be able to break Patty out without getting caught. Even if we do manage to get away, they would notice he was gone, and we’d all be punished,” Ben said. “Besides, we need to be there for Patty. We’ll do our best to comfort him while we’re there, but we’ll just have to hope that us being there is enough to help him out.”

“How are we all gonna get detention though?” asked Ali.

“Have you forgot where we are? They stick us in remedial study for fucking sneezing.” Ben looked around at his four friends. When they all caught his eye he nodded and they nodded in return. They split up as they all went to their second period classes, with Foley and Ali heading north and Awsten, Ben, and Otto going south. 

There was no need to say goodbye since they would be reuniting soon enough.

. + . + . + . + . + . + . 

“Attention!”

Patty instantly snapped up, tears pricking at his eyes at the sudden loud noise of Sergeant Steele’s voice. He blinked several times and, thankfully, the tears went away before Steele noticed anything.

He was the only one in the room, and Sergeant Steele seemed to be reveling in that fact. He slowly stalked towards Patty and inspected the mop he had dropped on the floor in his haste to stand at attention.

“You missed a spot, Walters.” Patty remained silent. Steele bent to pick up the mop and thrust it into Patty’s chest. Instinctively Patty reached out to grab at the handle, but this only made Steele push at his shoulder.

“Did I say you could move?”

“No, sir.”

Steele opened his mouth again— probably to berate Patty for speaking, too— but was interrupted by the door opening. Both Steele and Patty looked to see who it was, and Patty nearly cried in relief when Otto walked in.

“Ah, Wood. I knew I’d see you eventually today.” Steele sneered at Otto. “Well, come on, fall in line.”

As Otto moved to fall in beside Patty, the door opened again, but this time it was Ben who entered. He had black lipstick and eyeliner on, and Steele’s face twisted in rage at this.

“Jesus, Ben. You might as well start wearing a dress and selling yourself on the street corner.” Ben paid him no mind as he fell in on Patty’s other side. Steele sighed. He must have been upset with Ben for not reacting to his jibes.

“You’re all on cleaning duty again. Walters cleaned this room for the most part, but that stupid new hairdo probably blocks his vision, so I want all three of you to clean the next room to make sure he doesn’t miss anything.” 

“Permission to speak, Sergeant?” Otto asked.

“Permission granted.”

“There’s only one mop. How are we going to clean with only one between the three of us?”

Steele glared at him, but he must have seen Otto’s point because he told them all to stay put as he left to get more from the supply closet. Immediately after the door was closed, Ben turned and hugged Patty. Patty melted into the hug, and soon Otto joined in. That strange feeling from earlier welled up inside of Patty’s chest, and his arms tightened around Ben involuntarily. Patty started to panic again, but Ben and Otto pulled back before he could freak out too much.

“Why are you guys here?”

“We got ourselves in. Ali, Awsten, and Foley should be here soon.”

“You did _what_?”

“I told them about what Sharpe did, and we all agreed to meet here so we could keep an eye on you.” Otto said. Patty sighed but didn’t argue further about it.

“How did you manage to get in here, though?”

“Oh, please, it was easy,” Otto scoffed. He smiled and looked off to the side, kind of like what people did in movies or books when they were remembering something.

“Are you having a flashback or something?”

“Maybe.”

. + . + . + . + . + . + . 

“Good morning, class.”

“Good morning, Mrs. Graves.” Mrs. Graves walked loudly towards her desk, and Otto continued his drawing of her. She looked more like a twig than a human being, but Otto still gave her stick limbs anyway.

As soon as she turned around, though, Otto’s paper flew back into his backpack and his pencil returned to its spot on his desk. Thankfully she didn’t notice. She gave the class an accusatory glare before sitting down at her desk.

“You all know the drill. When your name is called, say ‘present’ and raise your hand.” Mrs. Graves pulled out the laminated roll-call sheet from the desk drawer she kept it in.

“Hunter Row.” She never went in alphabetical order; she switched up the roll call every day just to ‘keep the boys on their toes’. However, her plan backfired, since she didn’t seem to realize that she was calling out the names in the same order day after day anyway.

“Present.”

“Awsten Knight.”

“Present.” Huh. Awsten must be doing something different than what the three of them had planned out.

Mrs. Graves kept listing out name after name, rattling through the list of names until she was almost finished. Otto caught Ben’s eye, and the other boy nodded, a signal to go through with the plan. Ben slouched down lower in his seat, and a few of the other kids looked at him worriedly.

“Otto Wood.”

“That’s Mister Doctor Professor Otto Wood to you, ma’am.” Mrs. Graves, who had been dutifully reading off of the laminated sheet of paper, looked up in anger and horror. When she made eye contact with Otto and opened her mouth to reprimand him, he interrupted her by dabbing.

“Mr. Wood! That is not the proper roll call protocol! Make your way to Sergeant Steele at once.” Otto immediately stood up and walked out of the door, but he ran back in a second later to grab his backpack. Mrs. Graves soothed out the wrinkles in her pencil skirt before righting herself and continuing on.

“Benjamin Biss.”

“Suh, dude.” Mrs. Graves looked like she was about to have a heart attack. Ben had his feet propped up on the desk, and he threw up a peace sign for further insult. Somehow he had managed to apply makeup without her noticing. His lips were now black, and his eyes resembled a raccoon with the amount of eyeliner he was wearing.

“Mr… Just… Just follow Mr. Wood.” Ben stood up, bowed to Mrs. Graves, and then followed Otto’s route out of the door.

. + . + . + . + . + . + . 

“That was really all it took for you guys to get kicked out?”

Otto and Ben nodded simultaneously.

“Wow. Graves must have been really pissed off if something that small made her lose it.”

The door opened again behind them, and three heads turned in unison to find Foley and Ali entering the already-cramped room. Foley immediately ran to hug Patty as soon as he saw that Old Bastard Steele wasn’t in the room while Ali hung back and peered out into the hallway. The coast must have been clear since he stuck his head back in and went to join the group hug.

“I’m glad you’re not dead yet,” Foley said, words muffled by Patty’s shoulder.

“Thanks?”

“You guys didn’t tell us what you were planning on doing to get out of class,” Otto said. Foley and Ali pulled back to look at him.

“We didn’t discuss plans before we split up. I didn’t know we were supposed to.”

“We weren’t supposed to, but I want to know what you did.”

Foley smirked, and Ali seemed resigned to let him tell the story.

“It was the best fucking thing…”

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

“Hurry up, we’re gonna be late for class. We won’t get the chance to execute this plan of yours if we don’t even get to class in the first place.”

Foley turned to look at his roommate. Foley stared at him long and hard, until Ali held up his hands in defeat.

“Fine, whatever. What are you even getting out of there?” 

“Peeps.”

“Fucking excuse me? Did you say-”

“Peeps!” Foley gleefully held up his hands to show two packages of marshmallows shaped like baby chicks. One package had yellow Peeps and the other had purple, and Foley handed the purple ones to Ali.

“Have you been keeping these under your bed the entire time?”

“Yep. I’ve also got a ton of other candy bars. Turns out candy is like money at this school, and all of the sophomores are bad at poker.”

“What are you planning on doing with those?”

“You’ll see.”

After they had stashed the Peeps in their book bags they quickly made their way to their class. Ali and Foley planted themselves in their seats seconds before the bell rang. Mr. Mason looked up from his desk but didn’t say anything to them. Nothing happened for a few minutes as Mr. Mason finished up his writing. Foley used the opportunity to pass a note to Ali, and Ali slowly placed it on his lap before unfolding it. He caught Foley’s eye, and both boys nodded just as Mr. Mason stood up from his desk.

“We’ll be going over the homework you all had assigned over the weekend. Just as a reminder for those of you who didn’t do it, you were supposed to do all parts of problems 98 through 110.”

As the rest of the students rifled through their book bags to pull out the homework, Ali caught sight of Foley unwrapping his package of Peeps and shoving them up his uniform sleeve. Ali quickly did the same, rereading the note Foley had given him for further clarification. 

Once every student had placed their homework on their desk, Mr. Mason did a quick sweep of the room before nodding and moving towards the blackboard. As he passed by Foley’s desk, Foley shot Ali another look before raising his arm up to his face and fake sneezing. A marshmallow Peep flew out and hit Mr. Mason in the back.

The entire class was already silent, but after the Peep dropped to the ground the silence took on a new tone. It was more of a shocked silence than one that screamed “we’re being forced to remain quiet for hours on end every day”. 

Mr. Mason stopped in his tracks and turned around to face Foley, but by then Foley had already kicked the Peep underneath his desk to hide the evidence. 

“What was that?”

“What was what, sir?”

“What just came out of your mouth?”

“I… I sneezed, sir?”

This was his chance. Ali copied Foley’s earlier motion of raising his arm and fake sneezing, only this time the purple Peep landed right next to Mr. Mason’s foot. 

Mr. Mason did not seem pleased. He bent down and picked up the Peep with disgust, holding it delicately between two fingers as he examined it.

“Which one of you did this?” Nobody responded.

“I’m serious. Whoever did this needs to speak up!” There was still no response.

“Who-” _ACHOO_. Another Peep went flying. This time it hit him in the back of the head, and several of the boys snickered.

“What-” _ACHOO_. Another Peep hit him in the shoulder.

“Stop th-” _ACHOO_. A third Peep landed on his ass. A freshman boy in the corner snorted in laughter.

“Alright, one more peep out of you and you’re all out of the class!” Mr. Mason yelled. Ali and Foley turned to look at each other before standing up and fake-sneezing into their arms in perfect unison. Two Peeps flew directly into Mr. Mason’s face, one landing on the right side of his glasses and the other landing in his open mouth. The class burst out into short-lived laughter, but it quickly died down when Mr. Mason approached the two vigilantes.

“Both of you are to report to Sergeant Steele at once. You better thank your lucky stars that I’m not going to have you both expelled.”

“I would have taken expulsion over Sergeant Steele, sir, but since you insist…” With those final words, Foley left the classroom, with Ali following close behind.

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

“How the fuck are you two not dead and shoved inside Mr. Mason’s desk right now?” Otto asked. He looked more awe-struck whereas Ben seemed impressed. Foley only shrugged, and when Otto turned to Ali he copied the shrug. Ali had begun eating a single purple Peep while Foley was recounting the epic tale.

Loud and precisely-timed footsteps began to reach the ears of the five boys, and they quickly scrambled back into formation. Ali panicked and shoved the rest of the Peep into his mouth, swallowing the marshmallow treat a mere second before Sergeant Steele re-entered the room. The old man was carrying two more mops and an extra bucket. He stopped short when he saw Ali and Foley in the line, but after a few seconds he shook his head and closed the door behind him.

“So, you two decided to join the fun, eh?”

Neither Foley nor Ali responded. They knew better.

“Since there aren’t enough mops for-”

The door opened again, and Steele threw the mops on the floor in frustration.

“Oh, come on!” Awsten smirked at Steele’s agitation, but his facial expression fell back to neutral as he took his place beside Ali in the line. “How many more of you are there?”

“Just me, sir.”

“Did I give you permission to speak?”

“No, sir.”

“Then why are you speaking?”

“Because you asked a question, sir.”

Steele moved to stand directly in front of Awsten. His grey eyes were narrowed in anger, and he lifted Awsten up off of the floor by his shirt collar.

“If you’ve got anything else to say, you can say it in front of God.” 

Awsten, thankfully, kept his mouth shut. Eventually Steele put him back down on the ground.

“What are you even in here for, maggot? You’re allowed to answer that.”

“I set off a stink bomb in class, sir.”

“A… A what?”

“A stink bomb, sir.”

“... Well, if anybody was going to do it, I’m not surprised that it was you. Anyway,” Steele said, turning to address everybody in the room after he finished talking to Awsten, “you’re still on cleaning duty. Follow me.” He thrust mops at Ben and Otto, and handed the bucket to Ali, and stood by the door as the boys marched obediently out of the room in single file. 

As soon as the last boy— Foley— was out of the room, Steele turned and cut the lights off before closing the door behind him. Once the lock clicked into place, the metal crucifix on the wall slowly turned back to its original position.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this wasnt originally planned to be part of the story, but it is now. enjoy!! (also I reordered it so it makes more sense chronologically)

“You can go back to, uh, watching the rest of us,” Awsten Knight was saying. “I can put the chemicals away. And the mops and. Yeah. Sir.” 

Knight didn’t shrink at all under the glare Steele leveled at him. He was the kind of kid who would never learn respect. His constant presence at Steele’s remedial studies was proof of that. One day, he’d learn that his remedial study assignments were nothing compared to the prison sentence he’d inevitably earn himself once he was no longer a minor.

Steele drew closer to the kid and reached out to pull the container of bleach out of his hands. “Last time I turned my back on you and the cleaning closet, I came back to find half the shit missing. Is that what you made your stink bomb out of, huh?”

Knight’s smug half-smirk was answer enough. Steele narrowed his eyes. 

He’d see if the little brat was still laughing about it the next day when they were chopping wood in the chilly fall weather. 

As for the missing chemicals… he’d talk with Dr. Wraith about impromptu room inspections. He knew all about the loose floorboard trick— every single good-for-nothing miscreant who came to St. Stephen’s thought they were a genius hiding their shit in there. Steele practically had it memorized which boards were loose in which rooms. 

Meanwhile, Knight scampered away in the direction of his idiot-partner-in-crime Otto Wood. Steele shook his head disgustedly as he left.

He’d see them again the next day for sure.

After depositing the cleaning materials in the supply closet and _locking it_ , he returned to the remedial study room to lock up. The boys were long gone, along with their collections of missed work. Steele lingered in the room just long enough to clean off his chalkboard before switching off the lights and leaving. 

He headed for the main office. It wasn’t quite late enough that the chancellor would have left, especially considering it was a Monday. Steele picked up his pace as he crossed the courtyard in front of the school. He eyed a few stray boys wandering around in the corners, who hurried away like little cockroaches in the light. Steele gritted his teeth at the sight of them.

He entered the main office and walked straight to the offices in the back. Stopping at the farthest one, he raised his fist to knock on the door.

“He isn’t in today,” Mr. Grimm said, somewhere behind Steele. 

Steele turned around. 

Mr. Grimm, the secondary vice principal, was juggling some folders in one arm as he attempted to unlock his office two doors down from Dr. Wraith’s. He managed it after a moment, and nodded his head for Steele to follow. Steele did, albeit reluctantly.

He didn’t much care for Mr. Grimm.

“Where is he?” Steele said. 

Mr. Grimm dropped the folders on his desk and sat down at his chair. “Still at that conference. I know, _I know_ , I thought it was just supposed to be a weekend thing, but he called yesterday to tell me something came up and he’d be there until further notice.”

Steele scowled and crossed his arms. Unfortunately, Ms. Sharpe was also gone, judging by her darkened office that he had passed a moment ago. 

“Then I’ll need you to approve of a room inspection. I can do it tomorrow while the boys are all in classes.”

Mr. Grimm brightened up at that. “Room inspection? Who is it?”

“Knight and Wood. And probably Walters and Biss, too. I’ll just do their whole hall, but I know those four are definitely hiding something in their rooms.”

Mr. Grimm chuckled. “And how about Testo and Foley as well? Yeah, I heard _all_ about their little games from everyone during lunch. Amazing Walters dyed his hair as his act of rebellion though. From his file, I thought it’d be something a bit more… well. You know.” He broke off with a smile. 

Steele rolled his eyes. He really didn’t find it funny. It was fucking annoying. “I’ll just need to lock down that whole hall, starting first period.”

“I’ll help you out with that,” Mr. Grimm said. “I’m mostly caught up on all this,” he tapped the folders on the desk, “And I’m interested. I mean, getting their hands on snack foods is one thing. Even Knight’s chemistry project, we’ve seen that kind of thing before.” 

Steele’s eyebrow twitched. 

“But why the whole dying his hair black? I just can’t see that kid doing it for the attention. I mean, it probably wasn’t hard sneaking it in—”

“I inspected every bag these little shits brought with them,” Steele said icily. “I’d recognize hair dye.”

“You missed Biss’s makeup,” Mr. Grimm pointed out. 

“I won’t miss it during the inspection tomorrow,” Steele shot back. God, dealing with the vice principal was giving him a headache. It wasn’t as bad as working with the rowdiest of the boys— the ones who all needed constant forced reminders of why they should fear and respect him. But the man was still irritatingly cocky. Steele much preferred discussing things with Dr. Wraith and Ms. Sharpe. 

“See you tomorrow then,” Mr. Grimm called out as Steele left the office. 

Steele shut the door behind him and headed for the lounge next. 

There were only two teachers inside when he arrived: Mr. Sythe and Mr. Axworthy, both of them sitting at a table with papers scattered across the surface. Steele was relieved to see them and strode across to join them. Mr. Axworthy adjusted his thick glasses as Steele pulled out a chair for himself.

“I was surprised to find six of my students missing this afternoon,” he said in his softly wheezing voice. 

Steele sat down and glanced at the papers Mr. Axworthy was marking up with a red pen. Tests, it looked like. Mr. Sythe was also grading something, but his stack of papers was much more organized. Not for the first time, he was relieved he didn’t have to deal with that kind of stuff.

“Those six thought it’d be fun to spend all day cleaning the floors,” Steele said. “It’s like fucking babysitting duty. Every year, they have less and less respect. Wraith needs to let this school do corporal punishment again.” If he could actually force Ben to wash that girly shit off his face… or cut Walters’ ridiculous hair… 

Mr. Sythe rubbed at his face with a hand. “We used to do that here. Before you were hired, of course. My first year teaching here was the year they did away with it. Will, what do you remember about that?”

Mr. Axworthy’s pen halted for a second. “It was… well, Dr. Wraith always seemed pleased by the results, but… I think what we did here was a bit too much. You do a splendid job with what you do, Jason. It’s good for these boys.”

Steele huffed. “With some of these kids, it’s never gonna be enough.”

Mr. Axworthy returned to marking up the tests. “Believe me, Sergeant, St. Stephen’s past is not one that we want to revisit.”


	8. Chapter 8

When they returned to Room 129 after finishing their cleaning assignment, there were manila folders labeled with each of their names on Steele’s desk. Otto picked up his and made a face at how thick it was. This was the normal routine: picking up his folder of all the missed classwork at the end of whatever physical labor Steele had cooked up. But today it felt like there was more than usual.

“The hell is in here anyway?” Otto grumbled, throwing a quick look over his shoulder to make sure Steele hadn’t followed them back into the room.

Awsten and the others all crowded around Otto to pick up their folders. Otto flipped his open. 

“Oh fuck…” he said as he recognized the largest thing in the folder. 

“I forgot,” Foley whispered beside him. “That test in History.”

The test was in a large sealed envelope, upon which was written _Test must be taken ALONE and supervised by a member of St. Stephen’s staff. Due at the start of next class._

Otto looked at his friends. “Who are we going to get to sign off on these?”

Ali opened his mouth but before he could say anything, Sergeant Steele’s voice cut through the quiet of the room.

“You cupcakes gonna stay here all night?”

“No sir!” Awsten said, leading the way out of the room. Ali and Patty followed, and then Otto and Foley. Otto didn’t miss the glare Steele shot at Patty. Steele had forced Ben to wash off his makeup at the start of their detention, but he’d largely ignored Patty. It made Otto wonder what he’d said to him before they all decided to join him in remedial study.

As soon as they were all out of the main building, Ali motioned for them all to gather under a tree. 

“We’ll just take the test in the library,” he said. “Mrs. Fortune will be there. She might even let us all sit at the same table to take it.”

“Wait, she will?” Awsten said.

“She might,” Foley said. “As long as we’re quiet.”

“Um…” Patty said in a hushed voice, staring at the dead grass beneath their feet. “Can we get something to eat first? I kind of missed… lunch.”

Otto felt bad again. He looked to Awsten to catch his attention. Awsten blinked at him. For a second, he looked like he was going to protest, so Otto crossed his arms stubbornly.

“Alright,” Awsten muttered. He gave a heavy dramatic sigh. “Hey, Patty, we figured out a way to get into town on Saturday. We could—” 

“Wait, you _what?_ ” Ali said.

“Why is this the first we’re hearing this?” Ben demanded.

“Because the Ouija thing was more important last time we all talked?” Otto said. “And then the whole Let’s Get Remedial Study With Patty thing.” 

Patty was still looking at the ground but he smiled at that. 

“Anyway,” Awsten said loudly. “We couldn’t be out there too long, because someone was probably going to call the school on us. But we bought some, like, vegan things. For you. I thought we were going to get straight up murdered at that gas station, but—”

“You snuck out of the school to buy snack food at a gas station?” Ben said flatly. “And then came back, made a Ouija board, and got Patty possessed?”

“Yeah, that was our weekend, pretty much.” Otto said. “Patty, I promise we’ll try and turn your hair back to normal as soon as we can. And get rid of the stigmata.”

“I don’t think they’re actually called stigmata,” Ali said. “But you’d better run your idea past _all of us_ first so you don’t make things any worse.”

“Yeah, of course,” Otto said.

Patty sighed and Ben put an arm around him. “It’ll all be alright,” Ben said. Patty nodded. 

They made their way to the dorms first, passing a few groups of students who all stared at them— at Patty— with mixed reactions. Otto had to look back at Patty’s face to make sure the makeup hadn’t worn off. He was still safe, but that didn’t make his jet black hair any less conspicuous. 

As they walked the stairs up to their rooms, a group of other guys who all smelled like cigarette smoke watched them move past. Otto looked back at them after they passed, and saw one of them muttering into his friend’s ear.

His chest felt tight as memories of Chris and Freddie came flooding back into his mind. Memories of Jawn… Otto’s hands tightened into fists and he walked a little closer to the group as they got to their floor.

At his and Awsten’s room, they lifted up one of the loose floorboards to pull out the plastic bag full of their gas station haul. Otto sat against the door while everyone else either sat on the beds or on the floor.

“Loose floorboards?” Ali said, looking at Otto. “Kind of a cliche hiding location.”

“We don’t have a lot of options,” Otto said with a shrug. “And the loose boards came with the room. Last people in here used them too, probably.”

“Yeah, I’ve got them in me and Ali’s room too,” Foley said. “Keep all my stuff in there.”

“Thanks guys,” Patty said, opening another bag of trail mix. 

“How on earth did you get out anyway?” Ben said. “The fences around this place are iron. And like, twelve feet tall with those spikes on top.”

“Well,” Awsten said. “Turns out there’s a whole bunch of bags full of towels and shit that are just being used for rags. And Steele didn’t notice one of them going missing. Throw enough towels over the spikes and they don’t impale you when you climb over them.”

“And nobody saw you?” Foley said.

“Not at fucking midnight, dude,” Otto said.

“Oh, but we almost got eaten by some idiot’s outdoor dog that wasn’t fenced in or anything,” Awsten said. “If you’re ever going to escape this place for a night, don’t go through the woods and all that shit.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Ben said, sarcasm bleeding through his tone. 

“Yeah, you wanna come with us next time?” Awsten asked. 

“Let’s maybe save that idea for later,” Patty said. “We’ve got enough to deal with right now.” He folds up the empty wrappers and stuffs them in his uniform pocket. “I’m ready to go get this test out of the way if you guys are.”

“Alright then,” Ali said, standing up. 

“Oh, wait,” Otto said as the rest of them got up. “Patty, give me those wrappers. We gotta make sure none of the teachers and security staff see ‘em.”

Patty hands them over. “Where are you going to put them then?”

“Probably with the kitchen garbage next time Steele has us taking that gross shit out,” Awsten said. “Nobody looks through that disgusting stuff.”

“Oh,” Foley said. “I should get rid of the Peeps wrappers in that too, shouldn’t I?”

“Probably,” Otto said. 

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

It seemed like there was no end to the history test. Otto had dropped his head to the table in defeat at least a dozen times since he’d started. How the hell was he supposed to remember all of this bullshit? And the worst part was that the test wasn’t multiple choice. No, it was an eighty question short-response test and it was pure torture.

And he just couldn’t see the importance in any of it when there was a demon possessing the friend who was sitting just three feet to his right. There was no telling what might be going on inside Patty’s body— or his mind. Would things get worse as they left the demon alone longer? 

Otto blinked at the paper in front of him blearily. 

Awsten and Foley were also still struggling to finish their tests, while Ali, Ben, and Patty had all finished and were sitting quietly under Mrs. Fortune’s ancient stare.

Otto groaned and scribbled things he half-remembered into a couple more spaces. Some of them might have been right. If not, well, he couldn’t get remedial study just for failing a text. He’d get remedial study for turning in a blank test, however.

Finally, finally, _finally,_ he got to the last page and wrote an answer he actually felt kind of confident about in the last blank. He sighed in relief and flipped the test over. 

“Um,” Patty said in a whisper. Otto glanced at him and his stomach dropped when he saw Patty was covering half of his face. Covering his eye. Otto could see blood starting to seep from between his fingers. 

Oh no.

“Mrs. Fortune, can I be excused to the bathroom for a minute?” Patty said.

“Me too,” Ben said immediately.

Mrs. Fortune made an unpleasant face at both of them. “Hand me both your tests first,” she said in a croaking voice. 

Patty and Ben both were quick to hand over the tests before they sped towards the bathroom. 

The sounds of Awsten and Foley’s pens scratching against their tests sped up. Otto tried to keep still while he waited. Without really thinking about it, his eyes strayed to the seat that Patty had vacated. There was a small drop of blood on the surface of the table.

Shit.

“Okay, I’m done,” Awsten announced.

“Is Patrick done yet?” Mrs. Fortune asked, walking over to stand hunched over Awsten’s back.

“Just a few more,” Foley said. “Sorry.”

“Keep quiet,” Mrs. Fortune said. “Awsten, Alistair, Otto, I’ll take your tests now.”

Otto gave his up. Mrs. Fortune walked them over to her desk, signed them, and put them in a pile with Ben’s and Patty’s. Foley finished a moment later and Mrs. Fortune put all the tests into a big envelope and sealed it. 

Otto jumped out of his seat. Thank fuck, they were done. 

“Thanks, Mrs. Fortune!” Awsten said, already on his way towards the bathrooms.

“No running!” she called after him.

Patty and Ben were standing at the farthest sink in the bathroom, with a small pile of bloody paper towels in the sink. Patty was pulling another paper towel from his face, which was smeared with bloodstains.

Awsten groaned and quickly looked away from the blood. “Oh god, that’s bad,” he said, sounding sick.

“Great, you’re shit with blood; you can be a lookout,” Ali said. 

Awsten seemed to have no problem with that, and immediately left the bathroom. Otto, Ali, and Foley all headed over to Patty and Ben.

Patty dropped the paper towel in the sink. “It won’t stop,” he said. “And I can—” he suddenly cut off, a blank expression coming across his face. That couldn’t be good. 

Foley grabbed the pile of bloodied paper towels and shoved them into the nearest trash can. 

“What are we going to do?” Ben said frantically. “I don’t— I don’t know, I thought maybe it’d stop after a minute. But it hasn’t.”

Ali leaned closer to Patty as thin trails of blood started running down Patty’s face again. “Maybe… maybe it’ll just be a bit longer? Patty, do you feel light-headed?”

Patty was silent for a second. “I…” he finally said in a whisper. “I think I’m okay now…” He wiped the fresh blood away. Everyone (except Awsten) watched closely for a few seconds. There was no new blood.

Otto released a breath he’d been holding in, but he still didn’t quite feel relieved. Meanwhile, Ben and Ali were helping Patty wash away the remaining traces of blood. Thankfully, it looked like none of the makeup hiding the stigmata had been washed away, even despite everything that had happened so far. 

“We should get out of here before someone else comes in,” Ali said.

At that exact moment, Awsten stuck his head back into the bathroom. “Someone’s coming!” he said. “We gotta get out of here!”

Otto’s heart thudded in his chest. He looked at the blood still in the sink, at Patty who was seriously looking like he might collapse at any minute, at the distance between them and the only door. 

There was no time.


	9. Chapter 9

The moment the bathroom door opened, Foley instantly knew they were done for.

A group of four boys barged their way in through the small doorway, making the tiny school bathroom feel a hell of a lot smaller than it already did. Foley vaguely remembered seeing the same group earlier in the day when they had been huddled together on the staircase. He remembered that they had stared at Patty with thinly-veiled disgust, and one of them had been whispering to his friend as they passed.

The newcomers fanned out in a sort of semi-circle, probably to try and look intimidating. The smell of cigarette smoke and cheap cologne washed over Foley in a noxious wave, and he made a point of gagging and clutching at his throat. This only served to make the other boys glare at him.

”What are you freaks doing in here?” the supposed leader of the group asked. He was tall— about as tall as Ali, and Ali was _ridiculously_ tall— but his voice was comically high-pitched in relation to his size.

”What, we’re not allowed to use the bathroom anymore?” Ben shot back. It would have sounded cool if Ben wasn’t the size and weight of a toothpick. The leader’s face scrunched up, and he looked as if he was about to launch himself at Ben when Ali stepped in.

”We were just leaving. There’s no need to start a fight.”

”Who said we were the ones starting it?” This was the boy to the left of the leader. He was lanky and had terrible posture, and something about his face reminded Foley of a weasel. He took half a step forward, but the leader stuck out a hand to stop him.

”You pussies won’t be leaving here unless it’s in an ambulance. You go around wearing make-up and breaking the rules, and now you go and pull this bullshit?” He gestured at Patty, who had started leaning against Ben for support. “What’s wrong with him, anyway? He looks like total shit.”

”I don’t know what’s worse, the fact that you sound exactly like Old Bastard Steele or that you smell like a middle school boy’s locker room,” Awsten drawled, moving to stand next to Ali. It was usually funny seeing Awsten next to Ali, but this time Awsten just looked downright scary, and Ali’s intimidating aura only added to Awsten’s scariness factor. One of the four boys took a step back, and Foley felt kind of proud of Awsten for being such a scary bitch.

”Just let us leave, please. We don’t want any trouble,” Otto said.

”You should have thought of that before you all… you... What the _fuck_ is he doing?!”

Five heads turned to look at where the leader’s hand was pointing. Patty had once again started bleeding from his eyes, but his eyes were rolled back in his head. He collapsed against Ben, who looked like he was about to faint himself. When Foley lurched forward to help, however, Patty’s eyes returned to normal and he stood up.

”It’s alright, Foley, I’m fine.” Oh shit. That wasn’t Patty’s normal voice. Sure, it _sounded_ like Patty, and Patty’s lips were moving, but there was something else there that made it sound like somebody else was speaking through Patty.

”What the fuck?” Ben whispered. He had a couple blood stains on his shoulder from where Patty had been leaning.

”Hey, asshole, your eyes are bleeding!” The weasel-ish guy shouted. Patty smiled at him, and he walked forward until he was standing directly in front of Weasel Guy.

”Yeah, I know. Yours will be bleeding, too, if you don’t leave me and my friends alone.”

”Who the fuck do you think you are, pipsqueak?” Leader Guy shoved his way between Weasel Guy and Patty, and Patty had to tilt his head way back to look him in the eyes.

”I _think_ I’m someone who can make your life miserable, so I highly suggest you back the fuck—”

Patty didn’t have time to finish his sentence before Leader Guy punched him in the jaw. Blood and saliva went flying as Patty’s face flew with the momentum of the punch. Foley was almost sure that he heard a crack. Ali shot out his hands to catch Patty, but Patty regained his balance before Ali could help him.

There was more blood on Patty’s face, dribbling down from his mouth, and yet he still grinned at Leader Guy. The expression on his face scared the everloving fuck out of Foley. Judging by the mixed expressions of fear, shock, and terror on the faces of the other boys, he guessed they felt the same.

”You really should have left when I told you to.”

Foley wasn’t at the best angle to see whatever was going on, but he saw Patty close his eyes for a brief moment, and when he reopened them the parts of his eyes that Foley could see were pitch black. The four bullies gasped as Patty began to rise up off of the ground.

” _Run_.” The single word left Patty’s mouth with such power that the room seemed to shake with the force it exuded, and the four idiots didn’t have to be told to leave twice before they were turning tail and running out of the bathroom. As soon as they were gone, Patty dropped back down, hitting the tile floor with a loud and sickening noise. In an instant Ben was by his side, helping him to stand up. Patty looked even paler than before. The blood was still running from his eyes in tear-like tracks down his cheeks, and there was blood mixed with foundation and concealer dripping from his forehead as the line of crosses bled from underneath the make-up. Patty’s eyes were still completely black, but he blinked and they were suddenly back to normal.

”We should take him to the nurse,” Otto suggested.

”And how, exactly, are we going to explain this to her when we get there?” Ben responded, turning around to glare at Otto. Otto shrugged.

Patty let out a shaky breath before speaking. “Just… Just take me back to my room. I need— need to sleep.”

Ben nodded, looping Patty’s arm around his shoulder to support him as they walked. He stopped to wipe some of the blood off of Patty’s face with a paper towel before leaving the bathroom. The rest of the boys followed behind them, tentatively keeping an eye on Patty in case he needed help, but they eventually reached the dorm rooms without incident.

”Are you sure you’ll be okay, Patty?” Ali asked. His face was ripe with concern for his friend. Patty gave him a little nod in return, though he didn’t actually say anything. Ali nodded back before heading towards his room. Foley gave the others a small wave goodbye, following his roommate and closing the door behind them.

The two boys stood in silence for a moment, staring at each other and letting reality sink back in, before they each turned away and rummaged through their respective dressers for their pajamas.

”What do you think happened with Patty back then?” Ali pondered while they were both lying in bed later. It was well past curfew at this point— Steele always kept them out later than he was supposed to, and the test had taken longer than they thought it would— and Foley wanted nothing more than to go to sleep and forget about the events of the day. The incident with the Peeps already seemed like it had happened two weeks ago, but it was only this morning.

”Isn’t it obvious? It was the demon.”

”You really think so?”

”What else could do that? Unless Patty has superpowers that we don’t know about, my money’s on the demon.”

”We need to figure out how to get rid of that thing. Did you see what it did to Patty?”

Foley hummed to let Ali know that he heard him, but otherwise did not answer. He was right in the sense that they had to get rid of it, but the question was not what to do but how to do it. Foley didn’t have any experience with demonic possessions, so he didn’t have any idea what would get rid of the thing inside of his best friend.

He did know how to find out, though.

”Mate, do you still have your phone or did Steele already confiscate it?”

Ali was instantly out of bed, rummaging through his backpack until he held up the phone in question.

”Awesome, let’s get to work.”


	10. Chapter 10

The next day, first period went by peacefully. 

Awsten had just enough time to meet up with everyone else in the hallway in between classes. They all gathered under a dying tree outside. It was far enough away that they could have a private conversation, but they wouldn't be late for the next class as long as they watched the time. Everyone crowded around Patty, who was quiet but otherwise calm. It looked like the makeup was still working well to cover up the stigmata on his forehead. 

“How’d it go?” Foley said. 

Patty shrugged. “Fine. I mean, they all ignored me, but it’s better than what happened yesterday.”

“Hope that luck lasts the rest of the day,” Ali said.

“Are we meeting back here during the next break?” Otto asked. 

Ben nodded, looking at Patty. “Just to be sure.”

As they separated, Awsten glanced back just in time to see Ben put an arm around Patty. Patty visibly tensed up at the contact, but leaned into Ben anyway. Awsten frowned and looked away.

He sat down in his second class seconds before the bell rang. The teacher, Mrs. Hawthorne, walked in and didn't even bother to address the class as she picked up the stack of homework and promptly started teaching. Awsten slouched in his chair, knowing that Hawthorne wouldn’t care to look at any of them. 

It was just him in this class, which sucked. His mind wandered back to his former school, where he and Otto… and Jawn… shared most of their classes. Awsten’s hand gripped his pencil tightly thinking about Jawn. 

Jawn.

They were all supposed to be graduating together. They were supposed to be enjoying their senior year goofing off together. Not… this.

Awsten looked back at the blackboard at the front of the room but all he could think about is— 

Jawn. The hospital. Chris and Freddie. The car. 

There was a loud knock on the door that made Awsten jump in his seat. He sat up straighter, half expecting it to be Steele asking why he wasn’t in remedial study already. All of the students in the classroom were turning to look curiously at the door. 

Mrs. Hawthorne sighed. She walked over to the door and opened it. “Yes—”

Awsten’s eyes widened upon seeing the person outside of the door. He’d only ever seen that person once: during opening day when that guy literally told Awsten to say goodbye to his family because he wouldn’t be seeing them for the next nine months.

The other vice principal, Mr. Grimm. 

“Sorry to interrupt,” Mr. Grimm said, with a smile on his face that made it pretty clear he didn’t give a shit about interrupting the class. “But I need to see one of your students. Awsten Knight.” He stepped into the classroom and his eyes swept over the students, catching on Awsten right away.

Fuck, what did he do _this_ time? Or what had they finally caught on to? 

Awsten swallowed and reached for his bag.

“Oh, no, it’ll only be a minute,” Mr. Grimm said, waving at Awsten. “You can leave your things. Just come out here.”

It felt like every single eye was on him as he made his way to the door. Normally, Awsten didn't care. But normally, he was pretty sure of what he was getting in trouble for. And normally, it was the teacher sending him out.

The door shut heavily behind Awsten. He looked up at Mr. Grimm, who started walking off down the hallway. “Follow me,” he said.

“Uh,” Awsten said, but he started moving anyway. He didn't have much of an option. 

He followed the vice principal all the way to the main office, and then down into a side office. Mr. Grimm’s office, it seemed, judging by the name on the door and on his desk. There was nowhere for Awsten to sit, so he stood kind of awkwardly on the other side of the desk. There was a tied black trash bag sitting on top. 

“So, Awsten,” Mr. Grimm said, leaning back in his chair. “We get your kind a lot. Someone who gets in trouble all the time, sasses the good Sergeant, doesn’t give a shit about anything. Sneaking out, stealing, even playing with chemicals.”

Awsten felt like there was a vise slowly squeezing around his lungs. 

“Unfortunately, by law, there’s only so much we can do about that behavior of yours,” Mr. Grimm said. “There’s all this stuff about protecting minors. You’ve probably read up on it. Maybe?”

Awsten didn't say anything. Something told him that he shouldn’t sass this guy back. That didn't mean he didn't immediately hate him and how he was just casually mentioning everything that Awsten thought he was hiding so well. Steele hadn't noticed. How was this guy that Awsten barely sees—

“But pyromania… now that’s a different thing entirely.”

“What?” Awsten said. 

Mr. Grimm smiled at him and Awsten held back the urge to back away. 

“I know you’ve got a history of that, Awsten,” Mr. Grimm said. “But St. Stephen’s is an old school. Old buildings. I really can’t allow you to be playing with matches and candles in buildings made up of so much wood. In the past— well, we can leave the past in the past.” He laughed and Awsten’s skin crawled. “That’s what we’re all about, isn’t it? Moving forward, learning from our mistakes, all to become better people? So I’m giving you a generous second chance. I left all your snacks in your hiding place, but I’m confiscating your candles—”

“You found—” Awsten blurted out.

“You don’t seriously think you’re the first student to think of hiding things under floorboards?” Mr. Grimm chuckled. 

Awsten felt numb. 

“Maybe find a better place to hide them?” he suggested. “We found the loose floorboard in seconds. Oh, and maybe lay off the occult stuff too? Jason Steele just about lost his mind over your Sabrina the Teenage Witch setup... Ah, that reminds me. When hiding your things from now on, maybe consult with your friend Ben? We couldn’t find any of his makeup things in his dorm. Good job on his part.”

“I’ll tell him,” Awsten said hollowly. 

“Well, you can run on back to class now,” Mr. Grimm said. He patted the black trash bag. “I’ll hang onto these, alright? No more fires, Awsten.”

“Yeah. Yes, sir,” Awsten said. He escaped that fucking office as quickly as he could.

 

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

 

Awsten arrived at the tree before anyone else. He looked up at all the windows of the school with paranoia sneaking into his chest. Mr. Grimm seemed to know everything he’s doing… but how was he finding out? Did he watch them all like some fucking creep? Did he know about the stigmata and the blood?

A hand touched his shoulder and Awsten jumped. “Awsten?” Otto said. “You look like—”

“They went through our rooms,” Awsten said.

Otto’s eyes widened. “What? Who?”

Awsten opened his mouth to begin explaining, but then he saw the other four approaching, so he waited long enough for them to come close.

Ben took one look at Awsten and crossed his arms. “What happened?” he said.

“Alright,” Awsten said. All of a sudden, it felt like his heart was about to jump straight out of his chest. “So I get called out of class by fucking Mr. Grimm? Like, the vice principal that I’ve only seen like once? Yeah, he takes me down to his office and tells me that we went through our fucking rooms.”

“What?” the other four gasped in unison. Both Ben and Foley started demanding things, but Ali spoke up over both of them.

“We don’t have much time. We’ll have lunch after the next class to figure out— yeah. Awsten, did anything else happen?”

“Yeah,” Awsten said. “He didn’t, like, get any of your stuff,” he nodded at Ben, “But he took our candles. And probably the lighters and the sage.”

“Oh, I’ve still got _my_ lighter,” Otto said. He reached for his pocket and Patty quickly held a hand out to stop him from showing them. 

“But you didn’t need them, right?” Ali said. “That was just what you said you used to summon… you know what.”

Awsten looked guiltily at Patty, who was staring rather determinedly at the ground. “Yeah, but they’re still— if we used them for one ritual that, well, _sort of_ worked, we could theoretically use them again? Like, they’re already magic-infused, or something?”

Ali didn't look thrilled by that idea. 

“I want to at least get the sage!” Awsten said. “That’s good for, like, stuff. Cleansing or something. Right, Otto?”

“Yeah,” Otto said. “If they took the sage, then we either need to steal more from the kitchen, or we need to steal it back. I was looking into some anti-demon measures last night—” 

“Were you now?” Ali said skeptically.

“Yeah!” Otto protested. “None of it’s going to hurt him. It’s all like, using the natural power in other things to help cleanse… Patty. Or his heart or something.”

“This isn’t a damn game,” Ben said, stepping forward to glare at Awsten and Otto. “This is Patty. You’d better not be screwing us over even worse with these ideas of yours.”

“I promise, they’re not going to hurt him,” Otto said.

“Hey, uh, not to end an important conversation, but we’ve got one minute,” Foley said.

“Shit,” Awsten looked at the time. Less than a minute, actually.

“As soon as class is over, meet back here?” Patty said. “We’ll figure out what to do next.”

Awsten nodded, and took off in a sprint back towards the building. He stole one glance at the windows above and his heart stopped for a second when he saw a figure in a second-story window staring directly down at him. He blinked and it vanished. What the— No, that was probably just his eyes playing tricks on him. He shook the image out of his mind and rushed to class.

 

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

 

“Okay, Otto, you’re lookout,” Awsten whispered. He and Ali hurried into the main office, which was blessedly empty of any adults. They lucked out; it looked like they were all on their own lunch break for the moment. He went straight to Mr. Grimm’s office.

Which was locked.

“Fuck! There goes our luck,” he grumbled to himself.

“Move over,” Ali said. 

Awsten did so, looking at Ali and hoping he was about to pull out a lockpick or something equally badass. Since Ali was quiet and mysterious and Awsten still wasn't sure why exactly he ended up at St. Stephen's. Ali reached into his pocket and took out… a key.

Awsten blinked at it. “What’s that?” 

“Master key,” Ali said. “Stole it from Steele yesterday.”

Awsten’s mouth dropped open. “You… stole… from Steele?”

The door clicked open. “We’ll talk about that later,” Ali said. “I don’t know how much time we’ll have. Where’s your sage?”

Awsten walked into the darkened office. The trash bag had been moved to the floor beside the desk. He carefully untied the knot, and then took out the bundle of sage. He looked longingly at the candles and lighter. Especially the lighter.

That was the lighter that he used to—

“HEY, MISS SHARPE!” Otto’s voice echoed from just outside the main office.

“Come on!” Ali said in a fierce whisper. He reached past Awsten to retie the bag, and then he grabbed Awsten by the arm and pulled him back to the door.

“Mr. Wood,” Ms. Sharpe said, her voice rather faint.

“YOU, UH, YOU DOING ANYTHING FOR LUNCH?”

“Mr. Wood, if you do not lower your voice this instant—”

“Sorry. Um. Ma’am.”

Awsten and Ali both peeked around the corner. Ms. Sharpe had her back to them, but unfortunately, the only door was right next to her. There was no way they’d be able to leave without her noticing. 

“That’s better. Why are you loitering around here?” Ms. Sharpe says.

“Uh, thought I’d skip lunch. Seems like a better way to, uh, commit truancy than skipping class.”

“I don’t even— I don’t care. Just keep out of administrative areas.”

“Come on,” Ali said under his breath. He locked Mr. Grimm’s door as quietly as he could, and then he tugged on Awsten’s hand, heading for the front desk. Awsten followed. There was enough space under there for them to hide, but they couldn't exactly stay under there for long. Sooner or later, someone else would be coming in to sit down at the front desk. It was all they had though. He and Ali sat there, trying to breathe as quietly as possible as they listened to Otto and Ms. Sharpe.

“I’m, uh, I think I’m learning my lesson,” Otto said brightly. “Trying not to get in trouble. Isn’t that great?”

“Wonderful,” Ms. Sharpe said drily. “Excuse me, Mr. Wood.”

“Have a great rest of the day, Ms. Sharpe!” Otto yelled.

“Stop yelling!” Ms. Sharpe snapped back.

Awsten and Ali both flinched when they hear the door open. Awsten held as still as he could. He could hear the tapping of Ms. Sharpe’s heels against the floor for several tense seconds. A moment later, he saw her, walking back towards the office they just left. Awsten held his breath as he heard her pause.

Then he heard the sound of a key in a lock, followed by a door opening. Ms. Sharpe’s heels again, and then the door closed.

“Go!” Ali whispered. 

Awsten didn't need to be told twice. He and Ali both got up and moved as fast as they could. Otto looked relieved when they emerged from the main office.

“That was close,” Otto said. 

“That sage had better do something good for Patty,” Ali grumbled. 

“It won’t hurt him,” Otto said, a note of optimism in his voice.

 

. + . + . + . + . + . + .

 

They made it through the rest of the day's classes without incident. Awsten was kind of on edge the whole time, wondering if Mr. Grimm was going to take him out of class again. Going back to his office for the sage was probably a bad idea. They could have gotten more sage another way. And yet he was still regretting not stealing back the lighter too.

He could barely focus on his classes, but he wasn't kicked out, which must have been a good sign.

When Awsten hurried through the halls after classes were over, heading back to the dorms, he passed by Steele leading two students who had been in remedial study with him previously. 

“Hey sir!” Awsten said, slowing down long enough to wave at him. “How’s it been? I haven’t seen you since yesterday!”

Steele narrowed his eyes at him. Awsten’s brain took that moment to remember that Steele had gone searching through his room earlier in the day. Fuck. 

“Knight,” Steele spat. “You’d better pray that the next time you’re in my classroom, I’m in a good mood. Hell, better pray that you _don’t_ end up with me again. If I had my way, you and your little partner in crime would already be in two separate juvenile centers right now. Preferably on opposite sides of the country.”

Awsten’s smile faltered. Okay, yeah, maybe he’d been pushing it a bit recently. He didn't actually want to end up separated from Otto. And with Patty’s whole demon problem… yeah, he could tone down the pranks. Or just stop them altogether.

“Understood, sir,” he said, in the most respectful way he could manage.

Steele seemed pleased with his response. He nodded and continued on his way with his victims of the day.

Shit. 

Awsten didn't run into anyone else until he was at Foley and Ali’s dorm room. Everyone else was already there. Awsten took out the sage and set it down on the floor.

“Okay, so… what are we doing?” Patty said. “This thing inside me… I can feel it. It… it did that, yesterday. It’s got to be—” he cut himself off, biting his lip and looking down at the floor.

“Hey, it’s alright,” Ben said, reaching out to hold Patty’s hand. “We’re going to do something about it.”

“Has it spoken to you or anything?” Otto said. 

Patty looked confused. “Um. I don’t think so…”

“What?” Awsten and Ali both said.

“I mean… I guess last night, I kind of…” Patty grabbed his head with his hands and squeezed his eyes shut. “I dreamed— my dream was strange. I only remember bits, but there was a voice. And a lot of darkness, and this school—”

“What did the voice say?” Foley prompted. 

“I can’t remember,” Patty said. 

“What did you do to piss off this thing?” Ali asked, looking pointedly at Awsten and Otto. 

Awsten slumped. “I mean, I… was kind of rude to it? I didn’t… I didn’t think this would happen because of that. But wouldn’t it, like, attack me for that? Why would it possess Patty? And why would it do nothing until those guys last night were threatening us?”

Nobody suggested an answer. Awsten looked at Otto, the one person in the room who probably didn't hate him for antagonizing the demon. Well, maybe Patty didn't hate him either. Hopefully the other three didn't actually hate him. Because he really liked them all.

“Well,” Otto said. He picked up the sage and lit it with his lighter. “There’s some, uh, cleansing rituals. We can…” he stood up and starts walking around with the sage. Ali looked unimpressed, but Ben and Patty and Foley all looked hopeful. Otto shook the sage it all around Patty. Patty blinked as the smoke surrounded him. He coughed into his arm. 

“Do you feel anything?” Foley asked, leaning closer.

“Um,” Patty coughed again. “Not really?”

“It might take time to work,” Otto said. He set the sage down on Ali’s bedside table. 

Ali quickly picked it up. “You’re going to start a fucking fire,” he said. 

“Okay, what else do we have?” Foley asked Otto.

“Uh,” Otto went to his pockets and took out a shaker of salt, clearly stolen from the dining hall.

Ben groaned at the sight of it. “Please don’t tell me you’re going to dump that on Patty.”

Otto was at a loss for words. He lowered the salt shaker. “I’m… not?”

“Let’s move on to the next cleansing thing,” Ali said. “What else?”

“Yeah, sorry,” Otto said. He set the salt shaker down and Awsten promptly picked it up, rolling it back and forth in his hands. It could still work, he thought to himself. Maybe he’d go to Patty’s room after they were done and pour salt under his bed. It was worth a try.

Otto had taken two pencils out of his pocket. He held them up in a cross shape.

“The power of Christ compels you!” he said.

The room was very silent for a beat.

“Otto, shut the hell up. You’re not even Christian,” Awsten said, smacking the pencils out of Otto’s hands.

“Shit,” Otto said. “The power of, um, Zeus compels you?”

“Stop,” Awsten said.

Ali stood up. “If that’s all you’re going to—”

“Wait, I was going to try and make holy water!” Otto said. “We just need to bless—”

“I doubt you’d be able to bless anything,” Ben said. “Ali, Foley, do you have any ideas?”

“Actually, I do,” Ali said. He handed the smoldering sage over to Foley. “And they’re actually more likely to work, unlike _this_ —”

“I tried!” Otto said.

“You can’t seriously call that a noble try,” Ben said.

“Yeah, I’m gonna side with them on this,” Awsten said, bursting into laughter at Otto’s indignant reaction. They _were_ looking for actual results on this. They fucked with some really serious shit, and it was going to take some more serious shit to find a solution. For Patty’s sake, they needed to get their acts together really quickly.

At least Patty was smiling now, although it was probably from amusement at Otto’s antics. Awsten would count that as a small victory.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aw man sorry it took a while to finish this chapter -mani

By some miracle, everyone made it to the weekend without getting in remedial study again. There were some tense moments with a few of the teachers complaining about Patty’s hair, but each time, one of the others managed to distract the teacher by asking a question. 

Ali had tried to spend as much time as he could researching, but most of his free time was taken up by helping Foley and Otto with their assignments. The second half of the week was brutal with course work, and it took everyone’s combined efforts to make sure they all had their work done. It was worth it, though. Patty seemed exhausted every day, but at least he wasn’t dealing with Steele on top of it all.

It was also worth it seeing Foley become visibly more confident about going to class. Ali definitely wasn’t the best tutor, but Awsten and Ben were surprisingly smart and Patty was great at explaining things. When they all sat together and went through each assignment as a group, it was actually pretty enjoyable.

And when Ms. Sharpe handed back one of Foley’s quizzes with a “Uncharacteristic improvement, Mr. Foley,” remark, Foley had responded immediately with his own quip that nearly got him into remedial study. 

“Well, I’m not completely stupid, ma’am.”

Someone on the other side of the room started choking— definitely from laughter— but it was enough to draw Ms. Sharpe’s attention away from Foley. 

Ali had high-fived him the moment they got out of the classroom.

They gathered in Ben and Patty’s room again on Friday evening. 

"We've been reading up on demons and what they can do," Awsten said. "There's a lot of bullshit and, like, fantasy shit. But I think we've got enough credible stuff to work with. At least so we know what we're dealing with.”

"Turns out there's a lot more time in the day when you're not hanging out with Steele all afternoon," Otto added. 

“So what have you got,” Foley said, sitting forward.

“Well,” Awsten said. “Um. So, when I contacted the, uh, demon… the first time. It said it could ‘perform acts beyond human ability’ and ‘scar the souls of mortals’ and uh… yeah. I mean, I thought it sounded cool back then but…” 

Ali sighed and dropped his face into his hands. “Why the fuck did you— no, nevermind. I’m guessing it didn’t exactly say how long it would last.” 

“No,” Awsten said.

Ali glanced at Patty and Ben, sitting together on one of the beds. Patty had washed the concealer off his face after class. It was still kind of spooky seeing the marks, but Patty had assured them all that they didn’t hurt. 

“We saw what it did in the bathroom,” Ben said. “That’s definitely beyond regular human ability.”

“It’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Patty said under his breath. 

The room suddenly became about ten degrees colder. Ali looked at Foley, and then at Otto and Awsten. 

“You feeling alright, Patty?” Foley said.

Patty shrugged. “Yeah, don’t worry about me. Let’s just keep talking about this thing.”

After a moment’s pause, Ali spoke up again. “Well, since it’s inside you, somehow, I think we might be able to… sort of reach inside to try and calm it down.” He made a face. “It’s hard to explain, but… I looked into the sage and stuff, and I think… something like meditation could work.”

Everyone looked skeptical. Ali held up his hands. “Just listen, okay? It’s relaxing your mind, right? If Patty can sort of— I don’t know— find some inner peace, he might be able to have an impact on this—”

“So you think—” Ben started.

“No, he’s got a good point,” Awsten said. “What I’ve been reading, it’s all about how demons can overtake anyone, depending on how strong they are, but they’re especially attracted to people with, like, inner turmoil. This fucking school has been affecting all of us, right? The teachers are bad enough, but there’s all this freaky supernatural shit in every other dark corner.”

“What do you mean?” Ben said. “You guys summoned this thing, but that’s it, isn’t it?”

Ali crossed his arms. “No, there’s definitely something else here. Maybe… maybe some bad things happened here in the past and now this place has too much negative energy.”

“So the negative energy would attract other negative things,” Foley said.

“That ouija planchette,” Otto murmured. “We’re not the first ones to pick up on this.”

Okay, that made a bit more sense. Ali still felt like a bit of a lunatic saying this to Patty and Ben, but he was sure that his idea could help.

“Alright,” Patty said. “Meditation. I’m up for that.”

Ben rolled his eyes, but he shifted into a cross-legged stance on the bed. “Me too.”

“How’s it go?” Foley asked.

Ali walked everyone through the steps— which he got from a helpful book he had snatched from the depths of the reference section in the library. It was about forty years old but it seemed like a good idea when he saw it. And as the six of them all breathed in and breathed out and imagined retreating within themselves, Ali could feel the tension disappear. He almost forgot to keep reading as the relaxation spread. The room was still cold, but in a far less oppressive way.

As he continued reading the guide words, Ali looked around at all of them. And then he froze.

The marks on Patty’s face had gotten smaller. 

They were definitely still there, but they were thin and they almost looked like fading pink scars. Ali’s breath caught in his throat.

It was working.

Quickly, he went back to the book and talked everyone through the rest of the meditation exercise. And minutes later, everyone was opening their eyes again.

Foley sighed and slowly fell back so he was lying on the floor. “I feel so good,” he said.

“That was great,” Otto said. “I mean, I definitely feel better.”

“How about—” Ben cut off with a gasp. “Patty, your—”

“The stigmata!” Awsten exclaimed, jumping up. 

Patty’s eyes widened and he brought a hand up to touch his forehead. “Are they gone?” he said.

“No, but they look better now,” Ben said. “Less noticable. We’ll still need the makeup, but it’s—”

“Here,” Ali said, handing over his phone so Patty could use the camera to see himself. And fuck, the smile that spread across Patty’s face as he saw his expression was as bright as a sunrise. Ali looked around at everyone, seeing them all lighting up as well. Ben let out a cry of happiness and threw his arms around Patty.

“We’ll get this thing out of you,” Ben said, his voice muffled due to his face being pressed against Patty’s chest. “I promise.” Ali noticed a tiny dark red line start leaking from one of Patty’s eyes, but he swiped at it before anyone besides Ali noticed. Damn it, it was probably too much to hope that one meditation exercise would fix everything. 

Ali shut the meditation book. “I’ll leave this in your room so you can do it… every morning? Think that might help?”

“Yeah,” Patty said. He and Ben split apart and Ben reached out to take the book from Ali. “I… it’s probably still— you know— but this helped. Thanks.”

“I’ve got another idea,” Awsten said. “It’s sort of like meditation, but…” he gestured around, “Have you guys ever heard of lucid dreaming?”

“What?” Otto said blankly. Awsten swatted at him.

“It’s when you’re dreaming but you’re in control of it,” he said. “Like, you can change what’s going on and you can do whatever you want.”

“There’s no way to do that on command,” Ali said. He’d heard of lucid dreaming, and he’d done it before. However, whenever it happened, it was more of a realization that whatever he was dreaming wasn’t real and that it would stop. Usually nightmares.

“Is there?” Patty asked with a twinge of hope in his tone. 

“Uh… not that I know of,” Awsten said.

Ali groaned. “Then why did you bring it up?”

“I was just thinking— since this meditation stuff worked, and the demon’s probably like, sitting in Patty’s subconscious or something, it might be— well, if he _does_ lucid-dream in the near future, he can try and… communicate with it?”

“Is that even a good idea?” Foley said. “You saw what it did.”

Nobody said anything for a moment. Patty visibly deflated and Ali felt like kicking himself a little. They’d barely made any progress, and Patty was losing hope again. Fucking damn it.

“How about we just stick to meditating,” Ben finally said. “If this demon can take control of him and use his body to do whatever it wants, then it’s too risky for Patty to try and make contact with it.”

“But he might be able to—” Awsten started.

“What?” Ben said sharply. “Reason with it? Ask it politely to leave? Figure out why it went after Patty in the first place, after you were the ones who made it angry?”

Awsten slumped. 

“Hey,” Patty said. “I’ll try it.”

“Patty—” Ben said.

 

“I’m tired of waking up like this,” Patty said, raising his voice. “I’m tired of— of waiting for something to happen. Waiting for the demon to take over again or… to hear a voice in my head or something. If I can… if I can talk to it or… figure out what the hell it wants…” 

Ali reached out to put his hand on Patty’s shoulder. “Be careful,” he said. “If something happens, we’re all here to help you. We—”

Suddenly there was a loud bang on the door. Ali’s heart jumped in his chest. The door started to open and Ali leapt to his feet to put himself between his friends and whoever was coming in. Behind him, he heard Awsten and Ben whispering frantically and the others moving around.

“I know you’re all hiding in there, you cockroaches,” Steele’s voice boomed as he shoved the door open. Ali held his ground.

“We were studying,” Foley said, coming to stand right beside Ali.

“Sounds to me like you’re lying,” Steele said, looking over Ali and Foley’s shoulders. Ali remembered with a jolt that Patty’s makeup was gone. He had to hope the marks were faint enough that Steele wouldn’t notice. 

Thankfully, Steele just grabbed Foley’s arm and pulled him out into the hallway. “Get to your own rooms,” he barked. “Friendship time’s over.”

Ali bit his lip as he was marched back to his room. Once he and Foley were inside, Steele shut the door more forcefully than necessary. He hesitated by the door, trying to convince himself that it wasn’t a good idea to wait until Steele was gone and then return to Patty and Ben’s room. 

There was a small noise as Foley fell onto his bed. Ali turned to look at him.

“We made progress,” Foley said. “Something to feel good about.”

“I wish we could get rid of it,” Ali said. He gave the door one last look and then went to sit on his own bed. 

“We will,” Foley said with a confidence that Ali wished he shared. “Just got to keep working at it. Couple more things of meditation and he might be able to get rid of those stigmata.”

“They’re not stigmata,” Ali said. “They’re… stigmata are different. They show up on a person’s hands and feet. And it’s not a sign of demon possession, not from what I read.”

Foley looked curious. “Then what are the things Patty’s got?”

Ali shook his head. “I’ve got no idea. Maybe something specific to the demon. It’s—” he stopped as another unnatural coldness swept over him. From Foley’s grimace, he felt it too. Like he was sitting inside of a refrigerator.

“This school,” Foley muttered. “I can’t wait until we get out of here.”

“Yeah,” Ali said. 

“It’s like— everything here just makes it all worse,” Foley said. “All your happiness leaves and all you’ve got is apathy and bitterness. This place doesn’t reform you into something better; it just makes you miserable.”

Ali let out a short laugh. “Yeah.” His thoughts started to stray, thinking back to his own reason for being sent to St. Stephens. The screams echoed in his ear, like it was just yesterday—

“But at least we’ve got each other,” Foley said, snapping Ali out of his head. Ali looked at him and the optimism on Foley’s face was almost blinding. He smiled back.

Yeah. At least they had each other.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this took so long, ive been busy with school stuff and work but It Is Here Now

The school was gone. Patty opened his eyes to find himself lying underneath the shade of a large oak tree, the breeze rustling the yellowing leaves above him and stirring the surface of a lake that stretched for miles in front of him. There were no bleak and dull school buildings in sight, let alone angry faculty and weird supernatural entities.

At first, Patty felt euphoric. He didn’t know how he had managed to escape, but he was finally free of St. Stephen’s and that was all that mattered. And then it hit him— he didn’t know how he had managed to escape. He wasn’t even sure where he was, let alone how he got there or what happened to his friends. Dread set in where joy had been only moments before.

” _Aww, poor baby. Did you actually think you were ever getting out of that place_?” The voice came with the breeze this time, but it turned the leaves black and spread like ice across the lake. Patty was on his feet in an instant, standing alert and anxious. He knew that voice, but it had never spoken to him in a dream before.

The demon.

”What do you want from me?” Patty shouted. Suddenly his body seemed to move on its own, taking him to the edge of the lake. In the reflection Patty could see storm clouds gathering behind his head, and even in the dream there were two faint lines of blood seeping from his eyes. His reflection, however, wasn’t his own; the mirror image of himself was smiling, and Patty could see the evil radiating from that wicked grin.

” _You know what I want, Patrick_ ,” the demon cooed. It was surreal watching his reflection’s mouth move when he wasn’t talking.

”No I don’t!” Patty cried. He managed to stand up, but as he did the demon rose out of the water. He was still sharing Patty’s form, and as more blood trickled out of the demon’s eyes Patty could feel his own blood rushing down his cheeks.

The demon looked confused. “ _You don’t?_ ”

”No! I have literally no idea!”

” _Hm… I would tell you, but…_ ”

”Either tell me or get out of me. It’s your choice,” Patty shot back. “Personally, I prefer the latter.”

Demon and unwilling host stared at each other for a few moments, one gaze filled with humor and arrogance while the other was filled with hatred and fear. Eventually the demon sighed, advancing towards Patty. Patty tried to back away, but the rough bark of the oak tree hit his back and stopped his advance. _’That tree wasn’t this close before. He must have moved it. Does he have control of my dreams, too?_ ’

” _Oh yes, little one. I do. I’m feeling generous, though, so after I tell you this I’ll let you wake up_.” The demon was close enough that Patty could feel his breath on his face, and he couldn’t help wrinkling his nose at the foul stench of death that came out of the demon’s mouth. The fake version of him never stopped smiling as he leaned in to whisper in the real Patty’s ear.

”What… Are you serious? You’re only possessing me to-”

” _Yes. Yes I am. Although, I have to say, you’re by far one of my favorite vessels. I wasn’t particularly fond of the blond hair, though, so that had to go. Sorry_.”

”No you’re not.”

” _You’re right. I’m not_.” With a snap of his fingers, the world around his disappeared, and Patty opened his eyes to find Ben’s worried face hovering over him.

”Good morning to you, too,” Patty grumbled. Ben frowned at him, still not saying anything, and Patty frowned back.

”What?”

”Your eyes started bleeding in your sleep, and your… uh, they’re not stigmata, but the crosses on your forehead opened up again.”

Patty reached a pale hand up to his forehead, and when he pulled it away his fingertips were, indeed, covered in blood.

”Were you dreaming about the demon?”

”I… yeah. It spoke to me. It told me why it’s possessing me.”

”What did it say?” Patty opened his mouth to tell Ben what the demon told him, but nothing would come out. He tried again, but still no words were spoken into the charged atmosphere of the room.

”I don’t think it’s letting you tell me,” Ben hypothesized after a few more seconds of watching Patty struggle to speak. Patty sighed in annoyance and nodded.

”Probably.” Oh, so _now_ he was allowed to speak. ‘ _Fuck you too, demon_.’ Ben also sighed, scrambling backwards off of Patty’s bed. Patty felt a twinge of disappointment as Ben left his bubble of personal space. He wanted nothing more than to hold Ben and be comforted until the demon’s voice left his head, but St. Stephen’s classes didn’t wait for anyone’s mental health.

”Go get cleaned up, we need to get to class.”

* * *

Classes went by relatively okay, and before Ben knew it, it was already lunch time. He kept shooting worried glances at Patty, who would wipe away trails of blood from time to time and hope nobody had noticed. Ben had, however, and he was only growing more and more worried with every swipe of Patty’s hand.

Everyone else began noticing it, too, and Ben caught several worried looks from Foley and Ali.

”Hey, uh, Patty? Are you alright?” Ali finally asked.

” _Patty’s not home right now. I’ll take a message, though._ ” Ben’s blood ran cold as Patty lifted his head, revealing two solid tear tracks of blood and a smile so sharp it could easily tear through flesh if it wanted. Patty blinked, and his eyes were suddenly pitch black. The demon had taken over while everyone was distracted by classes and eating their lunches.

”What are _you_ doing here?” Awsten spat. The demon turned to face him, but the smile had faded into a glare.

” _Oh, it’s you. Fancy seeing you again, dickhead. Still trying to get possessed?_ ”

Awsten scowled at the demon, who laughed in delight. Heads were starting to turn towards their table, and Ben wasn’t about to get detention again just because of this stupid demon. He grabbed Patty’s hand— which had turned ice cold, thanks to his unwelcome guest— and dragged him into the nearest bathroom. The demon was chuckling the entire way. At least, it _was_ until Ben closed the door and slammed the demon against the wall.

”Why are you doing this? Can’t you just leave him alone?”

” _Hm… No, I don’t think so_.”

”Then tell me why you’re possessing him!” Ben yelled. He knew he probably shouldn’t raise his voice, but the demon was making him mad.

” _If I tell you, you have to promise not to hate me for it_.”

”It’s a bit too late for that. You possessed my best friend.”

The demon frowned, clutching his chest dramatically as if he had been wounded, but then his smile returned and he leaned in close to Ben’s ear and…

... and leaned down to bite his neck. Ben cried out, mostly in shock and pain, and retreated while the demon laughed. Ben wanted to punch him so badly, but the demon was still using Patty’s body, and Ben could never bring himself to hurt Patty. Foley, maybe, but never Patty.

”Get out of him, right now!”

” _No can do, dear_.” _Dear? What-_

Before Ben could contemplate what any of that meant Patty’s eyes rolled back in his head, and Ben barely caught him before he crashed onto the floor. When Patty opened his eyes again they were back to their regular blue and the blood had stopped flowing.

”What happened?” Patty asked. His voice sounded raw and broken, like he hadn’t used it for a few days. “I accidentally fell asleep during math, and suddenly I’m…”

Patty trailed off as he caught sight of himself in the bathroom mirror. His expression hardened instantly.

”Did the demon-”

”Yeah, it did.” Patty sighed, and with Ben’s help he made his way to the bathroom sink to wipe off the blood on his face. There was nothing they could do about Patty’s clothes, though, but luckily the red stains weren’t very noticeable on the black shirt of the school uniform.

When they eventually made it back to the table lunch was already almost over, so Patty and Ben shoveled down the rest of their food as quickly as possible before the bell rang.

”Are you sure you’re alright?” Foley asked. Ben wasn’t sure he had ever seen Foley nervous before.

”I’m fine, Foley,” came Patty’s automatic response. Ben thought he saw Patty’s eyes flicker back to black again, but he brushed it off as the weird lighting of the school cafeteria. Foley shrugged but the tension never left his shoulders, and Ben could tell he didn’t believe Patty.

Eventually the bell rang, and everybody got up as one and cleared the tables. Ben kept half an eye on Patty as he placed his tray with the others, but Patty _seemed_ alright at least. Ben was rushed off to English with Otto while Patty went with Awsten and Foley to Math. Ben yanked on Foley’s arm to tell him to keep an eye on Patty before they got too far away, and Foley clapped a hand on Ben’s shoulder to tell him that everything was gonna be okay.

If only Ben believed him.

* * *

Later that night, after Otto had fallen asleep, Awsten was still wide awake and staring at the ceiling.

Something was bothering him. The demon inside of Patty—it had taunted him earlier, joked about him still trying to get possessed. Awsten didn’t take kindly to being taunted.

”Who does that demon think he is anyway?” Awtsen grumbled. He was only so cocky because none of their friends had any way of stopping him, and he knew it.

Suddenly, Awsten shot up in bed, eyes going wide with realization.

”What if I had a way to stop him?” Otto twitched in his sleep but didn’t wake up, and Awsten silently snuck out of his bed. He quickly located the loose floorboard where Mr. Grimm had left all his snack stuff and opened a Chips Ahoy package. There, in the middle row (which had been emptied of cookies thanks to Otto), was the ouija planchette. Awsten took it out carefully, thankful that Mr. Grimm hadn’t actually gone through the food stuff. He quickly set about making another makeshift ouija board. This one was worse-looking than the last one, and the drawings and lettering were all done in Sharpie, but Awsten knew it would work.

He conducted his work in the bathroom. He brought out the sage and the salt shaker he had taken from Otto earlier and set up another ritual circle. He went through the same motions he and Otto had gone through the first time, and he smiled when he felt a now familiar dark presence in the room.

”Are you the same demon possessing Patty?” Awsten asked. The planchette slid to the hastily-scribbled ‘NO’, and Awsten’s smile grew.

”Okay, here’s the deal. I need you to possess me so I can save my friend. It’s kind of my fault he’s in this situation, but if you possess me I can fix everything. What do you say?”

The planchette on the board slowly but surely spelled out the word ‘SOUL’, and it took Awsten a minute to figure out what the demon meant.

”Uh, no. My soul is off the table. I just need you to possess me long enough for me to scare the other demon out of Patty.”

Once again the planchette slid to the ‘NO’. Awsten was having shit luck at getting demons to possess him.

”Okay, then can you at least tell me how to get the demon to stop possessing Patty? He’s going to die if it stays in him much longer.”

’ _CANT_ ’

”What do you mean? There’s no way to free him?”

Awsten’s only response, however, was the planchette moving itself to the ‘GOODBYE’ written on the end of the board.

”Wait, no-” Too late. The demon’s energy left the room, and Awsten got the sinking feeling that he had just accidentally released more evil onto the school.

Suddenly, the bathroom door opened, and Awsten looked up to see Otto standing in the doorway in just his boxers. Uh oh.

“I told you not to talk to demons anymore!”


	13. Chapter 13

Cornflakes were perhaps the worst thing Foley could have grabbed for breakfast. But at the moment, shoveling them mechanically into his mouth was the only action keeping him from completely losing it. 

Otto and Awsten were uncharacteristically silent. They’d sat down at opposite ends of the table when they first arrived. Well, _technically_ Awsten sat at his usual spot and Otto went out of his way to sit as far from him as possible. And despite the occasional kicked-puppy looks Awsten kept sending his way, Otto refused to even look at him.

Meanwhile, Ben and Patty, despite sitting right next to each other, were picking at their food with stiff motions. Neither of them were looking at each other, and the tiny amount of space between them might as well have been a deep, wide chasm keeping them apart. It was awkward as hell looking at them. 

Foley figured the thing between Ben and Patty had to do with the demon showing up the other day, but he didn’t want to bring it up. Most likely, Patty was still blaming himself and Ben had exhausted himself trying to convince Patty that he wasn’t responsible for the demon’s actions. 

Foley would have killed for some light conversation— anything to lift his mood before an inevitably awful day of impossible lessons— but the handful of conversation starters he mentally rehearsed all ended in someone blowing up at someone else. 

He risked a glance at Ali.

Ali set his spoon down and cleared his throat. Everyone except Patty turned to look at him.

“I was thinking,” Ali said. “Maybe— We all agree there’s something wrong with this school, right?” Foley inwardly winced. “I mean— the dark presences. The fact that there’s this demon that’s been hiding in here—”

“You mean _demons, plural_ ,” Otto muttered under his breath, leaning back in his chair and fixing Awsten with a glare. “Right, Awsten?”

Awsten slumped low in his chair. Foley thought it was a little harsh calling Awsten a demon, especially since he’d been trying his best to help Patty since he got him accidentally possessed. 

Awkward silence fell across the table again. After a few seconds, Ali opened his mouth to start again, but before he could, Patty stood up. 

“See you at lunch,” he said, his voice barely louder than a whisper. And he was leaving.

“Patty,” Ben said, abandoning his breakfast and getting up to follow after him. He caught up with Patty and immediately started trying to talk to him, but it didn’t look like Patty was responsive. 

Which left Foley, Ali, Otto, and Awsten at the table. Otto stood up as well.

“Maybe you should try meditation, Awsten,” Otto said loudly, not looking at Awsten at all. “Could be a fun hobby to take up instead of, oh, playing with lighters and candles. Or Ouija boards. You should ask Ali about that.”

Awsten looked absolutely devastated, but instead of chasing after Otto like Ben and Patty, he just pushed his breakfast tray out of the way and dropped his face into his arms on the table.

There was no easy way to leave after that. Foley decided he was done with trying to eat cornflakes and got up as Ali did. They picked up the other trays on the table and took them away, leaving Awsten there. As they went to leave the dining hall, Foley stopped and grabbed ahold of Ali’s sleeve. 

“I think it could be a good idea,” Foley said. “Looking around the school. You told me— there were that room that was locked up, right? There’s got to be some clues in there. Whatever happened that they don’t want us to know about.”

Ali crossed his arms, shivering slightly. “Yeah, but it’ll be a risk going in there. Steele and the other teachers are breathing down our necks lately. Grimm too. We might… we might have to wait until night to do it, when nobody’s watching.”

Foley’s eyes widened. “Uh…”

Ali managed a reassuring smile and reached out to pat Foley reassuringly on the shoulder. “Just— we don’t have to do it at night. A weekend might be better, right? This place is bad enough during the day. Don’t want to give us all a heart attack wandering around where there are ghosts and shadows everywhere.”

Foley tried to breathe a little easier. “Yeah. Alright.”

They were starting to run out of time, and Foley didn’t need a tardy entrance to start his day, so they split up to go to their first class of the day. Foley was a little surprised to see Awsten was already in the classroom, sitting correctly at his seat. When Mr. Sythe entered, Awsten didn’t make any of his usual snarky comments and just quietly got to work. It was weird.

Foley tried not to focus on Awsten and instead tried to pay attention to the lesson. It wasn’t— well, okay, it was kind of hopeless. As long as Mr. Sythe didn’t ask him a question, he’d be alright. He sat up straight in his seat and did his best to look like a model student.

And then, barely twenty minutes into the class, the door opened. Everyone went silent as Ms. Sharpe walked in. 

“Awsten Knight,” she said coldly. “Please follow me.”

Foley couldn’t help but be confused as Awsten obediently followed her out of the classroom. Awsten hadn’t exactly acted out that morning, or the day before. In fact, ever since the first day of the stigmata over a week ago, he’d not gotten remedial study once. Foley couldn’t imagine what Ms. Sharpe was taking him out of class for _now_.

Mr. Sythe was continuing his lesson, however. Foley tried to follow, but any attentiveness was gone. He kept looking over at the door, wondering when— and _if_ — Awsten was going to come back.

Soon, the door opened again, but it was only Ms. Sharpe.

“Patrick Foley,” she said. “I need to speak to you as well.”

Foley’s stomach filled with even more nerves than before. This had something to do with all of them. The glint in Ms. Sharpe’s eyes all but confirmed it. She put a manicured hand on his shoulder, her nails digging in painfully, and directed him through the halls.

Not to Steele’s room.

But to the main office. At first, Foley thought Ms. Sharpe was taking him to her office, but instead she kept going, to the office all the way at the back. The one with a sign on it that said. DR. WRAITH, HEADMASTER.

Ms. Sharpe knocked on the door. Foley noticed, in the faint light in this narrow hallway, that the wooden door was stained a dark red color. Almost brownish. Like old blood.

“Come in,” a heavy masculine voice said from the other side of the door.

Foley had no choice as Ms. Sharpe’s nails pressed even more painfully into the bones of his shoulder. She opened the door and dragged Foley inside.

The place felt like an interrogation room. There was a window at the far end behind Dr. Wraith’s massive desk, which looked out over the front of the school below. On the left wall was an old-looking charcoal drawing of the school, surrounded by dozens and dozens of photographs of boys in uniform standing in rows, all of them in black and white. The right wall was taken up by a massive bookshelf, which was packed full of books and things in plaques. Foley didn’t take too much time looking at it, because he was more concerned with the other things in the room.

The desk, the man sitting behind it, and a single metal chair planted in front of it. Which Awsten was sitting in, fidgeting.

“You may leave, Mr. Knight,” Dr. Wraith said. 

Awsten nearly jumped up out of the chair. He whirled around and almost ran straight into Foley. 

Foley’s heart sank as Awsten’s face contorted in horror. He opened his mouth, but Dr. Wraith spoke up again.

“If you would like assistance making your way back to Mr. Sythe’s room, I’m sure Sergeant Steele would be more than happy to come here.”

Awsten stiffened up. Meanwhile, Ms. Sharpe let go of Foley’s shoulder and walked around the room to stand behind Dr. Wraith.

“No,” Awsten said. “No, sir. I’ll… I’ll be—”

“I do hope you don’t get lost along the way,” Dr. Wraith added.

Awsten breathed in quickly. “No, I’m going. I’ll go there. I promise.”

And with a final apologetic look at Foley, he left the room. The dull thud of the door closing felt incredibly ominous to Foley.

With no other choice, Foley sat down in the chair opposite Dr. Wraith’s desk. The headmaster was motionless in his chair, staring down at Foley with a weight in his gaze that made Foley wish he could dissolve through the floor. Ms. Sharpe stood behind him, head held high.

“Patrick Foley,” Dr. Wraith said. “Do you know why you’re here?”

Foley didn’t want to look at them but he felt like if he wasn’t looking at them, things would be worse. “N-no?”

Ms. Sharpe sighed disdainfully. Dr. Wraith held his gaze. 

“Patrick, this school works to… give boys like yourself another chance. A chance to become better members of society. Graduates of St. Stephen’s are successful, respectful, and distinguished young men. Your grandfather is one of such graduates.”

Foley looked down at the floor. The floorboards were worn and smooth. They had creaked when Foley walked in. He tried to imagine his grandfather sitting in this same room.

No. Knowing his grandfather… probably not.

“Patrick,” Ms. Sharpe said. Foley fixed his posture immediately, meeting Dr. Wraith’s eyes again.

Dr. Wraith looked almost apologetic. “Patrick, you’re a bright boy. You could be on the right track to doing so well here. Your… _friends_ , on the other hand…” Dr. Wraith shook his head. “Boys like them, they just throw away chance after chance. For boys like Benjamin, Awsten, Mr. Walters, Otto, Alistair— this is their last stop before prison. And I just can’t stand seeing a good boy like you go down with them.”

Foley pressed his lips together tightly. His friends were good people.

Dr. Wraith smiled a bit sadly, but Foley felt anything but comfort from it. “Have they told you why they’re here, Patrick? The real reasons? Your roommate, Alistair? He physically assaulted four other students so badly that they were hospitalized. Awsten and Otto? Vandalism and destruction of personal property. They set a car on fire, Patrick. Did you know?”

Foley felt like the room was buzzing around him. That couldn’t be true. Dr. Wraith was just saying those things to… to get some kind of reaction out of him. But they were still shocking to hear. 

“Benjamin, I’m sure you can imagine,” Dr. Wraith continued. “Insubordination, threatening both students and members of authority. Not quite as bad as the others, but… _people like him_ … they just never learn. They think it’s good to stand out, make themselves targets. And one day…” Dr. Wraith exchanged a look with Ms. Sharpe that sent shivers down Foley’s spine.

“Almost a shame,” Ms. Sharpe said. “We see it all the time here, unfortunately. It always ends the same way.”

“And of course, Patrick Walters.” Dr. Wraith said. “What an act he puts up. The soft, sweet, innocent victim, right? What did Patrick Walters do to end up at a reform school?”

Foley shrunk under Dr. Wraith’s stare as he waited for the revelation.

“Assaulting a _police officer_ ,” Dr. Wraith said. “Involving himself in dangerous criminal activity. Protecting convicted felons. You wouldn’t think that looking at him, now would you?”

“Patrick, we’re concerned about you,” Ms. Sharpe said. “Lately, those boys have just been acting up nonstop. And they’re dragging you down with them. In fact, Sergeant Steele did a search of their rooms and found several occult items. Items that were stolen back not long afterwards. Don’t think that Mr. Grimm didn’t notice.”

Foley’s stomach dropped. Oh shit. His reaction must have showed clear as day on his face, because both Dr. Wraith and Ms. Sharpe looked at him sympathetically,

“Patrick,” Dr. Wraith said. “Just let us know what’s going on. Was it Awsten? Alistair? Mrs. Fortune has informed us that Alistair has been spending an increased amount of time checking out more… unusual—”

“No,” Foley said, his voice barely a whisper. “It’s not… it’s…”

Both Dr. Wraith and Ms. Sharpe fell silent. Watching. Waiting. Foley felt sick. His breathing sped up and he looked back down at the worn floorboards.

“It’s… it’s just a— a game. That I started.”

“You?” Dr. Wraith said. “I find that hard to—”

“I found a planchette in one of the abandoned parts of the school,” Foley said, mind racing to remember all the weird terms he’d been hearing the others say lately. “I made a Ouija board just to, you know, just to mess around. I found light and dark candles, got sage from the kitchens, started looking into books about demonic stuff. The… the school’s got this whole feel to it, you know? Like it’s haunted. I wanted to see if it was true…”

Foley looked up and it felt like his heart immediately left his chest. Dr. Wraith’s sympathy was gone. He looked like… it was worse than seeing Steele look down on them. Because at least Foley knew Steele’s plans just involved physical labor and yelling. 

There was no hint of Dr. Wraith’s plans in his cold blue eyes. And Ms. Sharpe was like a hawk beside him, assessing how fast it would take to rip Foley apart.

“So all of this misbehavior…” Dr. Wraith said. 

“I, um,” Foley felt like he couldn’t get enough air. “I think one night, the first night, the… the ghost stuff might have gotten out of hand. I woke up with gloves covered in black dye. And—”

“I think we’ve heard enough,” Ms. Sharpe said. 

“Patrick,” Dr. Wraith said. “I’m surprised at you. But you’re doing the right thing, telling us. It’s a step back in the right direction. But you know that what you’ve done is wrong, correct.”

Foley nodded, not trusting himself to speak. 

“Understand that St. Stephen’s is not a playground,” Dr. Wraith continued. “And it is certainly not haunted. This is an institution of reform and learning.”

“Yes, sir,” Foley said, trying to breathe normally. “I’m sorry… it got out of hand, sir.”

“I’m sure this game of yours will stop now,” Dr. Wraith said. 

Foley nodded again. “It will, sir.”


End file.
